Former prime minister: Pension reform needs to be put before people
The government’s proposal to change the pension system was not necessarily bad, but the issue needed to be taken up with the public, the European Commission’s vice-president for the digital single market, Andrus Ansip, said on Monday.
“I’m not ruling out that there are good ideas among the proposed ones, but these would have to be openly discussed with the people,” Ansip said on Monday speaking at the Tallinn representation of the commission.
To change the pension system, a mandate was needed by the people, and the reforms should not be “made in the shadows” and “concealing a part of the truth from the public”, Ansip said.
The situation needed to be explained to the people so that they could understand if the system needed to be changed at all, he added.
At the same time, Ansip did not agree with critics who said that after the present pension system was changed there would be no point in working hard and paying taxes. “The 2 percent of social tax, and 4 percent added by the state into the second pillar of the pension system will not disappear,” Ansip stressed.
After the proposed reform, people would be able to choose when they retire, get a partial pension, stop their pension payouts, and resume them at a better time. For the pension system to match current demographic developments, and to pay pensions equivalent to the present ones also in the future, the retirement age would be pegged to the expected average life expectancy starting in 2027.
Editor: Editor: Dario Cavegn
Source: BNS