EUpensiondebate - EUpensiondebate (19/07/2010):
What can be done to make public expenditures sustainable while facing ever increasing public pension expenditures?

Sommen L - CD&V (19/07/2010):
In Belgium, every political party is now convinced of the fact that people will have to work several years longer. This is the only way of keeping the costs sustainable and of assuring a pension that can afford a normal life style.

Stijnman, W.J.T. - FNV (19/07/2010):
It is no use to treat the EU as one unit. Its member countries differ widely in pension age, pension level, collective capital based pension provisions and private pension provisions. Also the life span expectations may vary.
It is impossible to formulate a "one size fits all" solution, though may be EU-wide bottom line can be agreed on retirement age vs pension level.

Magris G. - Citco Pension (20/07/2010):
* To face the increasing financing need:
1.Increase the defined contribution part at a flexibile retirement date (but after a minumum xyz years of contributions, depending on which sector of activity) materially reducing the defined benefit part
2. increasing the contribution % on salary
* To start to treat EU as one unit:
1. harmonise, at least at taxation level, over a generation period time, the tax treatment at the EU level
2. promote and give fiscal advantages to pan-european pension plan (IORPs)

EUpensiondebate - Eupensiondebate (28/07/2010):
What can be done to increase the participation of elderly people in the labour market?

Jean de laterasse - n.a. (28/07/2010):
The economic truth behind EUpensions is the EU economic decline.
EU countries do not have the money to keep their welfare system.
It is illogical to require older people to work longer when EU countries are unable to provide work to the new generation.
The right solution is to decrease all benefits.
The need will push naturally people to work cheaper.
This is tough but honest.

Stijnman, W.J.T. - FNV (28/07/2010):
I am member of the trade union FNV bondgenoten and member of the participants council of KLM Algemeen Pensioenfonds. The opinion expressed here is strictly personal and does not reflect an opinion of either organisation.
At present there is no labour market for people above 50, and there is certainly no part time job to change to for people above 60 requiring any intellectual capacity. At the same time many young people go unemployed because they lack experience at first and then are to old (expensive) and without experience. Employers, the public services first, must ask themselves if their organisation only requires young, ambitious and full time workers.
Older employees often want to change jobs, to decrease the stress load, to finally do things closer to their hearts or use all their experience accumulated in and especially out of their career. There remains the fact that bills still have to be paid and the children born at an ever increasing age of the parents may still need to complete their education.
1. To enable people to work longer there must be jobs for them first. Then to encourage this it must be profitable for both worker and employer.
2. For employers it must be financially attractive to supply these jobs without competition with jobs for the young.
3. State pensions must have a flexible retirement age and allow for early part time retirement when an employee wants to take a step down in career.
4. Early part time retirement may be followed by postponed full retirement to compensate for the decrease in pension level.
5. It must be fiscally facilitated to keep a job while receiving (part of) a pension.

EUpensiondebate - EUpensiondebate (23/08/2010):
What can be done to make pension issues understandable for working people?

Stijnman, W.J.T - FNV (24/08/2010):
How much education does one need to understand pension issues and why do we need a financial crisis to address specific pension education?

Pensions are part of the social security system and workers, to begin with, need reliable regulations and governments to safeguard their interests on the long term. Social security needs well managed non profit organizations to share risks and create sufficient volume. This also goes for all pension schemes, base pensions (mandatory by law), as well as supplementary or private pension schemes.
New employees often negotiate the salary level, they sometimes compare secondary benefits, and they rarely look at the available pension scheme. Has anyone heard of a worker refusing a job because of the pension scheme?
Certainly, education is necessary about pension issues, just as about other financial matters like mortgages, health care and other insurances, which involve decades of payments. Some may never understand, many will never like these financial issues. Yet everybody needs protection against 'financial advisors' caring more for their own benefits than for their clients' welfare. People at the start of their career must not be tempted to choose between a decent pension or the acquisition of a home and the start of family.

So:
Secondary schooling should prepare pupils for their first career step. Everybody needs to know what social security and a labour contract is about, how to compare benefits and what a pension scheme means in cost and benefit. As a start, Dutch law already requires employers to introduce and explain their pension scheme -or the absence of it- to a new employee.

Jan van Geffen Member Pensioenraad - Pension Fund Care & Wellness Netherlands (01/12/2010):
I am very interesting in this pensiondebate in relationship with the pensiondebate in our country and our pension fund about our visions at the future and our solutions for our problems
and our choices Defined Ambition ,Defined Benefit and Defined Contribution And how to make this pension issues understandable for working people The role of the government DNB National Bank and the politicians in this processes are very interesting and now more in discussion