A recent study has shown that 26.7% of the poorest Belgians will have died before turning 67. After the Federal Government pushed the retirement age from 65 to 67 from 2030 onwards, most of Belgium's most precarious workers will have passed away before being able to draw their pensions.
The health insurer Solidaris conducted the study as a way of investigating the Belgian Government's claims over their 2018 pension reform. They argued that raising the retirement age was in line with growing life expectancy in Belgium.
As indicated by a report in July of last year, Belgium's average life expectancy stood at 81.8, higher than the last recorded European average of 80.4. However, Solidaris argued that the Federal Government had not taken wealth inequality into account, which they believe to have a significant impact on life expectancy.
Their study aimed to discover how many Belgians would reach the age at which they were entitled to their pension.
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Their findings showed that over a quarter of Belgians in precarious positions will have passed away before the age of 67, compared to 13.1% of the country's richest individuals.
This disparity has led Solidaris to call for the retirement age reform to be scrapped and replaced with a pension plan in accordance with the arduousness of one's job. For the health insurer, allowing workers to retire based on their working conditions is the only solution to avoid "shifting the financial burden from pensions to disability benefits."
