The conversion rate for the pension fund must be lowered. Anyone who has saved a pension capital of 100,000 francs today will receive an annual pension of 6,800 francs upon retirement, because the rate in the compulsory part is 6.8 percent. It should now be 6 percent. So there would be 800 francs less per year.
This pension discount must be compensated with surcharges or even fully compensated. Parliament is currently struggling to decide how high the allowances should be and who should benefit from them.
More benefit recipients
The State Council Commission for Safety and Health (SGK-S) has now passed a revised draft pension fund reform draft by 8 to 4 votes. Although based on a model of the National Council, it expands the circle of recipients of the allowance. And the aim of the concept is to improve the situation for low pension savings. The SGK-S has optimized the undesirable effects of the original Commission proposal, she reports.
The Commission emphasizes the will to improve the situation for part-time workers and multiple workers through the reform of the occupational pension scheme (BVG). For this reason, the Commission maintained its original decision to significantly lower the pension fund entry threshold and the coordination deduction. The main goal here is to better place people with a low income with the pension fund. The Council of States will consider the bill in its winter session, which starts at the end of November.
Threshold at 215,100 francs
The core of the concept of the Committee of the Council of States is a lifelong pension supplement for the first 15 cohorts to retire after the reform. And it works like this: anyone who has pension assets of CHF 215,100 or less at the time of retirement should be entitled to the full supplement.
This allowance is CHF 2,400 for the first five years, CHF 1,800 for the next five years and CHF 1,200 for the last five years. According to estimates, a quarter of the insured in the transition generation would receive the full benefit.
Graduate allowance
Insured persons with a pension savings of CHF 215,100 to CHF 430,200 are entitled to a stepped supplement based on the SGK-S model. It is estimated that an additional 25 percent of policyholders in the transitional generation would benefit from this.
The SGK-S has taken a long time to look for a reform solution. As a result, the debate in the Council of States scheduled for the autumn meeting could not take place. How the lower pension should be compensated if the conversion rate is lowered from 6.8 to 6 percent was and is hotly debated.
threshold introduced
The social partners, employer and employee representatives previously agreed on a compromise, which was also supported by the Federal Council. This compromise provided for benefits for all new retirees. However, in December 2021, the National Council decided that only 35 to 40 percent of retirees from the 15th transition age should receive a supplement to compensate for the lower pension, broken down by age group. The result would have been pension fund losses for many retirees.
This summer the committee of the Council of States came up with a more generous proposal. This is also to increase the chances of the BVG reform in a referendum. With this first solution of the SGK-S, approximately 70 percent of the policyholders in the transition generation would have received the full benefit and 18 percent a reduced benefit.
The small chamber then decided in June for an extra loop and, at the request of States member Josef Dittli (65, FDP), sent the package back to the committee for review. The task: introducing a threshold for the imputation principle for the transition generation. Otherwise, the circle of recipients would become too large, according to Dittli of Uri.
Cost: 12 billion
The new model would cost about 12 billion instead of about 25 billion francs. The version approved by the National Council cost about 9 billion francs less, as significantly fewer BVG pensioners received an allowance.
However, the new Commission proposal is also not without controversy. The Swiss Federation of Trade Unions (SGB), led by Pierre-Yves Maillard (54), “categorically” rejects the proposal. The model is expensive and ultimately lowers pensions. Despite clear commitments and a rapidly deteriorating situation at the pension funds, the committee is clearly lagging behind the decisions it took six months ago.
Women would be at a disadvantage
In addition, women would have to wait decades for their pension to improve, because they are the ones who are not in paid work in the meantime, for example if they have had children. And they are more likely to work part-time than men. It is often the women who receive only a small BVG pension.
The focus of the BVG reform is also on the low incomes of some women: with an annual salary of 25,000 francs, the costs for the insured increased by almost eight percentage points to 160 to 250 francs per month with the latest commission proposal according to the SGB. In return, they received a monthly pension of nearly 500 francs as retirees for 40 years. So women should also be punished with enormous additional costs in the second pillar for the lower wages of women and the large amount of unpaid work? There is a clear no from the SGB.
tight voice
The SGB criticizes that the narrow vote on the September 25 AHV reform, in which those who voted in favor of raising the retirement age for women, was apparently not sufficient as a lesson according to the will of the SGK-S. From the point of view of the trade union association, allowances cannot be waived for all new retirees. He continues to insist on the compromise of the social partner.
However, this compromise is controversial in Parliament. Numerous MPs are affected by this, as it would permanently reinforce the redistribution of resources from workers to pensioners in the second pillar. The bourgeois majority in the councils therefore strives to limit the redistribution in the billions. (SDA/pt)