Live data from Hacker News

Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

telegraph.co.uk

461–470 of 1001 posts

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#461
post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'll keep getting worse, as more and more people concentrate into large cities. And large cities are family-hostile. The birth rate in cities is strongly anti-correlated with the city size. People just don't feel content and happy to have children in dense cities. Japan is very illustrative in this regard. Young people are forced into unaffordable cities, where they often live in cramped shoebox-sized apartments. Wh…

Do you envision we will see any forced egalitarian land/wealth distribution?

Why? The land for habitation is not scarce. The entire US urban footprint is around 2% of the land area.

The unaffordable housing cost is entirely an artifact of urbanism gone wrong.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess - they'll just gut the benefits to anemic levels for everyone slowly rather than some big easy to point to maneuver like this.

Whoever does that will get voted out. Voters over 62 make up >25% of the midterm vote. By 2030 - that number could easily be >30%.

Not sure about the US, but from what I have seen in Europe the questionnaires show that older people are actually for these policies more so than young people, especially when they are already retired and thus not affected. In Germany, two thirds of retirees answered for abandoning a public holiday while everyone else was by majority obviously against it.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#464
post #409

This is truly sad. As a Swede I fear my country may follow suite. The retirement age in Sweden used to be 65 and now it's 67. Looking at older people around me, most lead a much less active life after 75. So, if we were lucky we used to have some 10 good years of doing whatever we wanted before old age and age-related diseases start affecting us so much we become limited to a much smaller world. But now we have maybe…

I’d rather a robust pension starting at 70 than an anemic one starting at 55 or an underfunded one starting at 65.

You can fill a gap before that pension starts with part time work etc. It’s much harder to make up a shortfall when you’re 85.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#465
post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back when it was first introduced, it was based on life expectancy and few were expected to live beyond retirement age. [1] [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/10/how-ret...

Turns out retirement is just an illusion to convince you to give your best years for the system.

No need to do any that, if you don't like the idea and have something else that works for you. But most people are somewhat mid and really don't.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#466
post #202

Why do people owe me a nice retirement? I never really got the idea of state-funded retirement. Perhaps I should feel I'm owed something if I'm too fragile/disabled to work, but I don't know why age alone should grant me anything? Appreciate this is a controversial view so interested in hearing why I'm wrong so I can stop holding it. I think retirement should just be replaced by disability welfare to be honest.

Just to throw out one reason - it's valuable to working people because they don't have to take care of their parents in old age. Can't speak to Europe, but Social Security in the US is definitely not enough for a "nice retirement". It may help a frugal person in a low cost of living area cover their basic expenses.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#467
post #288

Where I live, people have issues getting hired past age 50, and it’s near impossible past age 60. It’s a stroke of luck if you score a job then. So yes they can raise retirement age, but that will just create misery for all those who can’t cling to a job long enough. There‘s got to be a better way.

Part of the reason employees are reticent to hire someone past 50 is before they worry they’ll retire soon, even if they’re mentally and physically in good shape. So increasing the retirement age might actually improve the ability of folks in their 50s to find work. Not saying this is a great trend, but it’s unavoidable due to the low fertility rate (already a problem everywhere in the developed world and soon to be…

Young people today job hop like there's no tomorrow.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's only one issue I can think of with your idea that someone who is 75 now leads a life as you're describing. The generation they belong to are predicted to live to what 80-85 years? Whilst we (assuming you're in your 40's now) are predicted to get to what 90-95 on average? Average lifespans are increasing, and on top of that the mobility of someone who's 75 now, won't be the same of someone who's 75 in another…

Does anyone know if there's any kind of metrics for healthspans? Meaning the "good" part of life before it's just doctors, medicine and retirement homes. My impression so far is that we've done a lot of work at the lifespan, less at the healthspan. What's the point of living until 90 if the last 15 years isn't that fun at all.

Healthspan in Denmark, who just raised the retirement age, went up from 67.6 to 71.0 from 2000-2019. (+3.4 years) https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/healthy-life-expectancy-a...

Contrast this with Denmark's lifespan growth over the same period, of 76.8 to 81.4 (+4.6 years) https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy?time=2000...

So from the data, prior to covid-19 Danes had gained about 3 and a half years of healthy life, and an additional year of unhealthy life.

It makes sense that Healthspan and lifespan are well-correlated, as most of the ways we have of extending lifespan do so in a way that makes you clearly healthier (such as preventing chronic diseases).

That said, it is true there is a bit of an increasing gap. This isn't just in Denmark, it's global - lifespan rose by 6.4 years from 2000-2019 while healthspan only increased 5.3 years. https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/mortality-and-globa...

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#469
post #352

While the increase is not too bad, they should invest in having babies instead of making the old people work.

Just saying, that will not have any positive effect until 2050. We are far to far in the incoming crash. And that is not even talking about the strain that will hit the health care sector, no matter what we raise the retirement age too.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#470
post #409

This is truly sad. As a Swede I fear my country may follow suite. The retirement age in Sweden used to be 65 and now it's 67. Looking at older people around me, most lead a much less active life after 75. So, if we were lucky we used to have some 10 good years of doing whatever we wanted before old age and age-related diseases start affecting us so much we become limited to a much smaller world. But now we have maybe…

There's only one issue I can think of with your idea that someone who is 75 now leads a life as you're describing. The generation they belong to are predicted to live to what 80-85 years? Whilst we (assuming you're in your 40's now) are predicted to get to what 90-95 on average? Average lifespans are increasing, and on top of that the mobility of someone who's 75 now, won't be the same of someone who's 75 in another…

At least in the US, the SSA projects current 30 year old men to live another 48 years, putting them dead around 78. 30 year old women are expected to die around 82. [1] A quick Google shows life expectancy is about three years higher in Denmark, not an extraordinary difference, and some of that number is probably lower infant mortality.

Barring some revolutionary technological breakthrough, we aren't going to be living, on average, into our 90s.

[1] https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/NOTES/as120/LifeTables_Tbl_10.html

Post reply on HN