„I know there is some group that has it set task, to propose to increase the retirement age and then it will become a real fight. I promise them that“.
This is what he warned before "This morning" on bTV Dimitar Manolov, president of KT ''Support'' and member of the Supervisory Board of NOI.
He also commented on the subject of the second pension pillar and pension funds.
Inflation has melted the money for a second pension - data from the Financial Supervision Commission for the last 20 years show.
For this period, the yield of the various universal pension funds ranges from 65.2% to 125%. And inflation for the same period is 126.5%.
Nearly 2 million retirees received an 11 percent increase as of July 1.
The minimum pension for seniority and age is now 580 BGN and 57 cents, and the social pension for old age - 307 BGN and 7 cents.
According to data from the National Social Security Institute, the number of adults with pensions and supplements below the poverty line of BGN 526 is decreasing, but nearly 325,000 people remain below it.
„In no way should we compare the two things – the state social insurance and the “second pillar”. They function on a completely different principle and the only thing that unites them is that they work with the money of the insured persons”, commented Dimitar Manolov.
„From the money of the insured persons in the first pillar, the money of the current pensioners is paid, and the others are invested”, he explained.
„This system has a serious flaw that has existed since the beginning and continues to be available, even though it was reduced a little bit," Dimitar Manolov stated.
"Private pension funds maintain an entry fee that is huge and provide no service for it. Zero. The funds are collected by the NRA, distributed among the lots directly by the NRA. If the idea is to use this fee for the pension funds to collect their funds, to distribute them, it makes sense. But they don't. This money is a gift to them, and it is not a small amount at all," commented Dimitar Manolov.
„When calculating the yield, private pension funds have the right not to deduct inflation”, he added.
The expert pointed out, however, that the big question is that no one can say, if we allocate, for example, BGN 1,000 from a salary to a pension fund, how much we will get in 20 years.
„It depends on the economic environment. They have a series of restrictions in their investment policy and cannot risk investing. Information is difficult to access for people without special knowledge”, explained Dimitar Manolov.
He added that he insisted for many years that the information people receive should look like this: On the left, how much was withheld, and on the right, what the lot looks like.
„But they refuse to do this, because then many things will be seen”, pointed out the president of CT ''Support''.
„The law did not allow all funds to be received in bulk, but only small amounts. And this is again in the service of the pension funds, because the costs of paying out small amounts every month can exceed the actual amount that is paid out. And if there is a serious amount of funds accumulated, they cannot be paid out in bulk”, explained Dimitar Manolov.
„Our pensions are not as far behind as wages,” he pointed out.
„All the nonsense that happens in the country is the result of not having a stable government – gangs, robbers, fires”, Dimitar Manolov thinks.
The expert also gave an absurd example. “A person who has been insured all his life on a minimum insurance income – 40 years, he will receive a pension at the age of 65, some kind of minimum, although his insurance contribution will not be enough for the minimum pension. A person who for 14 years and 11 months is insured on the maximum insurance income will have a larger insurance contribution and the first one, but he will retire at 67 with a reduced pension. This is absurd – that's the system, it's allowed by law”, Dimitar Manolov explained.