4d ago

Denmark raises retirement age to 70 — the highest in Europe

www.cnn.com

Denmark raises retirement age to 70 — the highest in Europe | CNN Business

Denmark is set to have the highest retirement age in Europe, after lawmakers voted to raise it to 70.

Parliamentarians passed a bill mandating the rise on Thursday, with 81 votes in favor and 21 against.

The new law will apply to people born after December 31, 1970. The current retirement age is 67 on average, but it can go up to 69 for those born on January 1, 1967, or later.

The rise is needed in order to be able to “afford proper welfare for future generations,” employment minister Ane Halsboe-Jørgensen said in a press release Thursday.

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4d ago

Denmark raises retirement age to 70 — the highest in Europe

www.cnn.com /2025/05/23/business/denmark-retirement-age-rise-70-intl-scli

87 comments

why are so many people ok with raising the retirement age? it's literally of zero benefit to anyone who isn't insanely wealthy enough to just quit working whenever they want. if they ever worked in the first place
- The regulation is such an insane patchwork, sometimes people can retire earlier than the normal retirement age, if they've been working for many years. And if you health is bad there are special programs for that. (Yes as in multiple!)
  But clearly as you state, the system is made to benefit the rich more an more. The social democrats who are part of the government are no longer looking after the average Joe, but making things worse, and then they make special programs for propaganda purposes.
  A lot of people have been convinced this is necessary, as life expectancy increases, disregarding increased automation and wealth in our society.
  
  if you health is bad there are special programs for that.
  Hate that, work until you're 70 and too old to enjoy retirement. Or work until you're so sick you can't and then you don't get to enjoy retirement.
  A system designed to ensure you work until your labor has no value. Squeezing for everything you're worth
- Because it's what the insanely wealthy want and that's the only thing that counts
- We are heading into a period with severe labor shortages as the elderly retire. Who will take care of the elderly? Who will handle be their doctors/nurses? This is not a problem that can be solved with money unfortunately. You need to either relax migration rules so foreigners take these jobs (very unpopular atm) or increase the retirement age.
- Because poor pensioners dying would look bad politically.
  Stems from low birth rate and an insanely large boomer group.
- It's of benefit to society to reduce the dependency ratio (the ratio of non-working to working people)
  If the number of people the government needs to support with state pensions rises, but the working age population doesn't rise nearly as much, government finances become more and more pinched
  
  reduce the dependency ratio
  i can't help but think this "problem" could be solved in ways other than forcing people to work until they're 70. like for instance TAX THE FUCKING RICH
  i know propaganda is a powerful weapon, but you should be extremely skeptical of the people saying "the problem can't be solved any other way..." and what their motivation might be (spoiler: keep themselves rich at the expense of everyone else. including, apparently, the elderly who have already spent their life working)
  
  This does nothing for the current problem, which is the single largest group of people, Boomers, needing their State Pension paid, as Denmark is paid for out of general taxation, and these changes do not apply to this group, as it only applies to some of Gen X and younger. This is the same group PAYING for the boomers retirement, so they being asked to pay more than ever before and getting fucked over with the higher retirement age.
- trying to avoid solving the actual issue, of thier low birth rates.
- It means more tax take and less superannuation spending. Depends on the country's superannuation system, of course.
  That means more money available for all the things taxes are used for, many of which are very very necessary.
  How can you justify cuts to the healthcare system because you claim to not have enough money, but then pay pensioners some thousand dollars a fortnight, regardless of what assets or other income they have?
  
  Seems like they oughta tax the rich higher, not make the poorer work till they collapse
"Raising and enforcing taxes on the rich" or "destroying the middle class, work them to death and make them cheer about it.". That's definitely a choice many countries are making right now.
- and make them cheer about it
  even in this very thread...
- All of them, it seems like. Not all at the same speed, but still.
So this rise for Denmark does not kick in on people born before 1970, so it does not count for baby boomers or the oldest and usually wealthiest sub set of Gen X. Oh, also Danish politicians can still retire at 60 right?
This is fairly typical with these age rises, applies to everybody BUT the largest group who have caused all the problem by being the largest group and who often haven't paid their fair share in a lot of schemes as a lot of state pension schemes are a Ponzi scheme rather than an actual investment fund, including the Danes as its paid directly out of taxation.
This means all the poor fucks who will now retire later will still be paying for that largest ever group to retire at an earlier age.
What is particularly insidious with this type of change is that the private pension age has also been raised for people in the UK. This means even if you can afford to you cant take it as early as you once could. Absolutely done because they will be means testing the UK state pension at some point.
- I generally think all politicians should be forced to retire from political work by at most 60yo.
  
  I agree, also term limits for all of them.
  However its egregious for them to be raising the mandatory retirement age for everybody else while leaving their volentary retirement age where it is, and with a particularly fat pension, its about £4k a month for only twenty years of service.
- Danish millennials and gen xers who work in retirement or old age support roles should change careers. And zers and alphas getting into it should consider hiatuses.
I don't think the shithead oligarchs who barely work a week outta the year should get to tell the working class how long they are forced to work.
And where do you expect them to work? No one is going to hire a 70 year old! (Except the US, bonus if they're a rapist and felon)
This is getting ridiculous...
Work all your life to feed the pyramid pension scheme and when you finally retire, you're too old to do anything meaningful with your life.
I am a teacher and I could not imagine staying in a classroom for another 7 years. I barely made it to 63. My retirement begins next week. I just hope 50k a year is enough. That was my goal and when I it it I said I am done.
- Congrats on retirement! What are you planning on doing with your newfound freedom?
  
  This is America, work a different job.
  
  Well I was going to go out west for a month but I don't feel it is worth the hassle of putting up with the possibility of dealing with ICE. While I am a pale white old fucker my wife is not.
Why do only the "later" generations get shafted though?
- Cod e the people passing the law are probably in the earlier generations... They don't want to fuck themselves over
- Later generations have more time to prepare for retirement, rather than simply axing the benefits of the people that have already retired.
I think the average lifespan in America is 67.
People would be truly working until death, there.
- I mean US retirement age is 67, so we're doing that already.
  
  You guys are retiring?
  
  Heh. "67 SO FAR" -- homer
- Try 78: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/life-expectancy.htm
  Obviously not everyone reaches that. Even if you set the retirement age at 50, some people would die first.
- 79 in fact. Pretty low for a country that rich, but to find 69 you have to go to Africa or the poorest Latin or Asian countries.
Simple. They want more people to die before being able to claim retirement. Dead pensioners are free.
It doesnt apply to politicians though....
in this thread: Americans who have absolutely no idea what society looks like in Denmark. Or anywhere outside of the US actually.
- Most Europeans have a poor understanding of what the USA looks like as well... Turns out that most people have no idea what most of the rest of the world looks like! This could even mean inside of their own country! The USA is quite large and very much varied.
  
  For the topic of this thread in particular I see a lack of knowledge that the average lifespan in the US is a full four years shorter than in other comparable countries.
  https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-life-expectancy-compare-countries/
- The channel Economics Explained actually covered Denmark on this weeks video essay. The impression that I got is that they really have their shit together, even these planned retirement age changes are expected to be gradual so people can plan for it.
We’ve reached a point where my retirement plan involves suicide. It’s cheaper and I don’t want to go through all the health issues my parents are. Go to any nursing home and look at all the people so drugged up they have no idea where they are. People are just miserable and don’t even comprehend what is happening. That’s not living. That’s being kept alive by your family cause they are selfish.
- That's why you have euthanasia laws in some countries. It allows you to say goodbye with dignity while you are still sane. For example, if you get diagnosed with an aggressive and untreatable cancer, it allows you to say farewell to your loved ones before you become a husk of your former self simply waiting to die.
- What spooks me is that most of the people currently living in these institutions likely would have had the exact same thoughts when they were younger.
  The vast majority apparently fail to follow up. Will you? Will I?
I have very little confidence I'll get a retirement. Even though I'm contributing to the Canada Pension Plan, I'm so far away that by the time I get there I have serious doubts the program will still exist. There is obviously calculations they make to determine the health of the fund, but I don't think they are properly taking into account how much extra strain extended life expectancies will take on the program. If they plan for people to be on retirement for an average of 15 years, and suddenly that changes to 20 or 25 years, that fund will dry up quick. Combine that with the influx of boomer retirees and to me it doesn't look so good.
- We never know there could be a huge mega virus or giant mass cult death or something look on the bright side /s
And then come the robots and AI, and there are no jobs anymore. Then they have a problem with too much unemployment.
- Not to mention the consumer base that makes this all function collapses.
  
  Whoever owns the most effective killbots at year 0 inherits the earth. Everyone else gets murdered or starves to death.
- This is my main issue with it too. I can retire at 72 or later.. in more than 40 years. I'd expect to be replaced long before this, so what's the point?
Wtf Denmark
Part of it makes sense. We live longer and longer, retirement age is something that needs to be adjusted with the human lifespan.
The problem is that our idea of what "work" should be is so awful that people look forward to retiring, and logically complain if they are denied the opportunity.
- If our Quality of life is increasing shouldn't we be working less and for shorter periods of our lives?
- You’ve seen a lot of oldies that are in working order after 60+? 70+? They are exceptions, not the norm. Longer isn’t healthier. Not on a functional level. Especially for those not in an office which is I think the majority.
- Ah, yes, the old argument of "you live longer, so the billionaires get to own more of your time".
  No. How about if I get to live longer, I get to enjoy my tiny little bit of time longer? It isn't scarcity by nature - it's scarcity by design.
- We live longer and longer, retirement age is something that needs to be adjusted with the human lifespan.
  Should it? We live longer and longer, but we're also more and more productive. 50 years ago, for example, the national labor force produced enough for them and (almost) everyone else to retire after about 40 years of labor. Certainly lifespans have increased, but have they increased more than the productivity of the national labor force? I doubt it. Productivity has definitely increased enough to make up the difference in lifespans, especially since most women now work, meaning essentially double the number of workers. In that case, should we not spend the extra time (which we have earned with our own labor) with our families and friends rather than sacrifice it to some rich prick whose only contribution to society is a portfolio? There's something distinctly dystopian about the idea that living longer means we should dedicate our time to enriching the already filthy rich rather than enjoy life.
- ... in Denmark? I mean, they're the happiest population on Earth in general.
  I'm just across the channel in southern Sweden and there's no way I'm going to retire already in 17 years (67, which I think is the current retirement age for us)
- That make sense to you?
- We live longer and longer, retirement age is something that needs to be adjusted with the human lifespan.
  I think it has more to do with the baby boom right after 1945. If those older people retire, there isn't enough younger generation to support them, so more people need to work longer, so we don't get too many retired people all at once.
  I think it's more of a "can we support the retired" kind of issue - not just "muh money". It's a little more nuanced than that.
  
  If that were the case, they'd be increasing the retirement age for everyone, not just people under 55.
  If they're short on funds for the people about to retire, it means those people haven't contributed enough to fund their own retirement.
Denmark is set to have the highest retirement age in Europe, after lawmakers voted to raise it to 70.
In addition, Denmark has the highest top personal income tax rate in Europe in 2025, at 55.9%.
So I guess this is actually great news for everyone here that loves paying taxes, as now they get to do it even longer! Bummer all the people making a decent living off of these taxes (politicians) won't participate. Who could have seen that coming?
In Iceland we have massive pension funds where people pay for their own retirement.
EuroSocdem moment

87 comments