Finance minister says retirement age will have to go up

As life expectancy climbs, there will be no choice but to work longer and retire at a later age, Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said Saturday.

Steinitz told a crowd in Kfar Saba that life expectancy has been rising rapidly over the past decades, while the retirement age has barely budged,  Hebrew daily Israel Hayom reported Sunday.

“There will be no choice” and Israel will need to “raise the retirement age,” Steinitz said.

Specialists from the Treasury estimate that men’s working age would be driven up from 67 to 70, while women would retire at 67 instead of 64.

All the countries in the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, besides France, are either actively raising the age of retirement or looking into the option of doing so, Steinitz said.

“It will happen here, whether we want it or not,” he said.

He did not give any sort of timetable for implementation.

Germany was the first country to set a pension age, introducing retirement at 65 at the end of the 19th century. While the phenomenon has grown since then, the age has not risen, leaving Western countries with growing life expectancies hurting at the bank.

Raising the retirement age would ease the burden on younger generations and keep retirement funds from growing too thin too soon, proponents say.

Of the OECD’s 34 countries, 28 (including Israel) have already started implementing or looking at the option of implementing a move to raise the retirement age.

Doing so, though, is considered political suicide in some circles.

MK Haim Katz (Likud), who heads the Knesset’s welfare committee, told Israel Hayom he would not allow Steinitz to raise the retirement age.

“It won’t happen in the near future,” he said.