Deutsche Welle, 22 October 2013
Gaps in
Germany's statutory pension system have forced nearly a half-a-million retirees
to turn to local welfare offices for subsistence funding. Unions and charities
are demanding that the government intervene.
Germany's
federal statistics bureau said on Tuesday that 465,000 retirees older than 65
were registered in 2012 as dependent on basic welfare subsidies. That was a 6.6
percent increase on the previous year and almost twice the count in 2003.
The DGB
trade union federation said the true level of impoverished elderly in Germany
was twice as high as the registered level given in the official statistics.
DGB
presidium member Annelie Buntenbach said it was commonly known that many
elderly persons among Germany's 20 million retirees felt ashamed and did not
submit formal applications for basic assistance to their local authorities.
The
chairman of the AWO workers' charity, Wolfgang Stadler, said without reform of
Germany's pension system, which is funded by monthly transfers from employers
and employees, Germany would end up with millions dependent on basic welfare
assistance.
Metropolitan
poverty
The
statistics bureau based in Wiesbaden said German retirees classed as
impoverished lived mainly in larger cities.
On average
across Germany, 3 percent of all retirees drew basic welfare allowances. In
Hamburg the level was 6.2 percent; in Berlin 5.3 percent, it said.
Last week,
the tabloid "Bild" featured a DGB survey that indicated that 42
percent of employees in Germany assumed that on retirement their statutory
pensions would be insufficient to make ends meet.
More than
two-thirds said they had little or no entitlements to supplementary pensions
that some employees accumulate during their working lives.
ipj/hc (epd, Reuters, AFP)
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