June 10, 2013
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2013 June 5 - 11 [POLITICS]
Abe Cabinet aims to further extend pension eligibility age |
The Fiscal System Council in January this year stated in a report to the Finance Minister that the raising of the pension eligibility age is “inevitable” because Japan’s population is increasingly aging.
At present, people can receive national pension benefits from the age of 65. Meanwhile, the eligibility age for employees’ pension payments has been gradually raised from 60 to 65.
The average amount of employees’ pension benefits is 161,000 yen a month in 2011. If the starting age is lifted by five years, the reduction in the payouts will total around 10 million yen. In addition, more people will die before they get their benefits.
It is a “national fraud” that the state takes a lot of money in pension premiums from workers and fails to pay back the greater part of it to them.
The proportion of companies which keep employing workers over 65 who want to continue working is 48.8% as of June 2012 according to a survey by the Labor Ministry. The figure is 51.7% among small- and medium-sized enterprises, and only 24.3% among large corporations.
The ministry itself acknowledges that quite a few workers might fall into a no income state if they cannot receive pension payments or obtain post-retirement employment.
It is a violation of the constitutional right to life for the government to raise the eligibility age to 70 under such circumstances.
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