"Should women retire later?"

Does the age of public retirement not increase too fast? It is no longer just the unions that are asking this question. Economists, demographers and employers are also beginning to wonder if the previous firm, Rutte II, has not yet passed. For each year that average life expectancy increases, one more year must be worked. The active part of our life is becoming bigger and the part we take in retirement is decreasing

Researchers from the Dutch Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI) made a proposal on Tuesday to solve this problem. In one study, they wrote: Linking the age of state retirement to the level of education. The higher your education, the longer you have to work longer. This would be more accurate because, on average, less educated people start working earlier, work more physically and die earlier.

See also: The less educated must retire earlier than the most educated & # 39;

Is this feasible? Fieke van der Lecq, a retired market professor at VU University in Amsterdam, wondered. There are also very educated people who have hard work or low income. You see that, for example, with people who work as independents, she says. "Sometimes they do something completely different from what they are trained for: the accountant opening a restaurant."

Marloes Lammers, social security researcher at the SEO economic research agency, also sees practical objections. For example, students know that they have to work four or five more years after graduating from higher education. "Then you discourage to follow a higher education."

Lammers would then find that it's smarter to have the AOW benefit start after a number of years of work. "Then you say: after forty or fifty years of work it was enough."

"The woman also lives longer"

The NIDI researchers thought it was fair to make a difference. They write that an unskilled 67-year-old still has an average of 18 years to live in 2021, compared to 21.6 years for a highly educated person. "On average, women are living longer than men, should women also retire later than their husbands?"

According to the NIDI study, three AOWs would come: for highly educated people ( higher vocational education and university), the least educated (primary school, pre-vocational secondary education, MBO-1, vocational secondary education) vwo) and secondary (all in between)

Highly educated people would continue to follow Expected increase in the age of retirement, to 67 years in 2021 and then increasing with life expectancy.The increase for people with a low level of education and the secondary level would be delayed.In the coming years – at least until 2030 – their age of AOW would be frozen at 66.

The FNV union thinks it's a good idea. " even better to study the proposal ", explained e spokesperson Harrie Lindelauff, "but there are many positive elements."

Nevertheless, the union would like to go even further, because for people with heavy occupation is. That's why they want it to be possible – as in the past – to take early retirement. "We are pleading for the fines to be dropped," says Lindelauff.

To read also: What is a heavy job, and what is not ?

At present, unions and employers will soon ask the government to delay the expected increase in the age of public retirement – for everyone. In return, the social partners support the government with the introduction of a new complementary pension. The social partners are still negotiating these plans

That is why the CNV trade union federation and the VNO-NCW and MKB-Nederland employers' associations are reluctant to respond.

Volksverzekering

Professor Van der Lecq understands that there is a discussion about the rapid rise in the retirement age, but she says that letting a state pension go is a change " fundamental "for everyone, which must be carefully considered. "The AOW is a national insurance for all, regardless of the level of education or professional history.Many people who did not work were receiving AOW: housewives, detainees, people in a shelter or monastery. "

Van der Lecq ultimately finds it important that people with a heavy profession be helped less hard work. "All energy should be concentrated on that.There are also highly educated people with a heavy profession to benefit from, such as Air Traffic Controllers.You will not keep this all your life."