Today’s news / Young early retirement on increase

Young early retirement on increase

Over the first three quarters of this year, more than 16 000 new early retirement pensions were awarded, the largest increase in the number of early retirement for the same period in the past 20 years, according to the trade association SMVdanmark, Politiken reports. Overall, there are currently more than 243,000 early retirees, compared to just under 207,000 in 2018. The development is completely contrary to the intention of the reform of the early retirement pension scheme that came into force in 2013, the newspaper writes. At the same time, the figures show that the number of young people taking early retirement continues to rise, even though the aim of the reform was that young people under the age of 40 should only be granted early retirement in special cases.
     Jesper Beinov, director of the trade association for small and medium-sized enterprises, SMVdanmark, tells Politiken that the reform has failed and that the municipalities have not been able to cope with the task. “The municipalities have not fulfilled their task, and the politicians at Christiansborg have not kept a leash on the reform, so it has gone off track,” he says. From 2018 to 2022, the total municipal expenditure on early retirement has increased from DKK 24 billion to almost DKK 30 billion, according to the municipalities’ own figures. /ritzau/