Despite 40 years of contributions
Millions of pensioners get less than 1200 euros
02/20/2022, 02:18 am
Working a whole life and still the pension is hardly enough to live on – for millions of people in Germany this is reality. 2.7 million pensioners receive less than 1,200 euros per month, even though they have been paying for 40 years.
Almost 2.7 million pensioners with at least 40 years of insurance receive less than 1,200 euros in pension per month. This emerges from a response from the Federal Ministry of Labor to a request from Left Party leader Dietmar Bartsch, which is available to the editorial network Germany (RND). 38 percent of those who have correspondingly long periods of insurance are affected, i.e. more than one in three of the group mentioned. Among them are around 1.2 million pensioners with at least 45 insurance years, writes the RND.
The differences between East and West are striking. In the west, with at least 40 years of insurance, it is about every third person who stays under 1200 euros, in the east it affects every second person in this group. The figures correspond to the status of December 31, 2020, according to the federal government there are no figures for 2021 yet.
“If 40 insurance years do not protect against poverty in old age, we have a system error in the pension,” Bartsch told the RND. The numbers are a result of “decades of misguided labor market and pension policies”. East Germany is in danger of becoming a “mini-rent country”. Lifetime work must be worth significantly more in the statutory pension. “No one should fall below 1200 euros pension with 40 years of insurance,” demanded Bartsch.
The so-called “corner pensioner”, i.e. a person who has always paid contributions for an average salary for 45 years, can currently count on a standard old-age pension of 1539 euros (old federal states) or 1506 euros (new federal states). However, the average pension actually paid out is significantly lower, namely 944 euros in the west and 1172 euros in the east.