Publi Pension Replacement Rates Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Publi Pension Replacement Rates - Essay Example Even the marital status is a point of concern for some countries. The earnings level of the worker is also taken into account. This level dictates the amount of their contribution. The duration of membership of a worker in the pension plan is factored in in the replacement rate computation. Another cause of the variance is the type of employment, whether it is full-time or part-time. The public pension replacement rate was a major contributing factor in the debt burden of Greece. The average earner with a full career in an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country, of which Greece belongs, has a pension replacement rate of 58.7% of earnings (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 2007). However, in Greece, the replacement rate was at a high of 96% of earnings (OECD, 2007). This rate is considered to be very high. In 2010, Greece’s pension system had approximately 400 billion euros or $509 billion in unfunded liabilities (Oxford Analytica, 2010). The excessively high replacement rate forced the Greek government to make emergency grants to meet the pension outlays (Oxford Analytica, 2010). Nektarios describes the Greek public pension system as one which is â€Å"highly segmented and complex, containing over 300 funds, with many different regulations for pension rights† (n.d.). Because of these chara cteristic of the public pension plan, it was difficult for the government to manage. One proof that the public pension replacement rate contributed largely on the debt problem of Greece are the reforms in the pension plan that were instituted by the EU and the IMF. Some of these reforms that were dictated upon on Greece include introduction of a unified statutory retirement age of 65 by December 2013; the gradual increase in the minimum contribution period for retirement; and the reduction of pension benefits to be based on the pensioners average pay over their working lives