A brief history of automatic pension equalization
The intervention of Michele Poerio, general secretary of Confedir and national president Federspev
The pensioners, represented by FEDER.SP and V. (Federation of Pensioners and Widows) and by Confedir (Confederation most representative of public and private management, middle managers and high professionals), my intermediary as National President and Secretary General, premise the following:
a) have been "Executives" for over 35-40 years, period / working life during which social security contributions were paid for an amount, discounted at the date of termination of active service, from 1.8 million euros to over 2 , 2 million euros, paying at the same time as income tax over 1.2 million euros;
b) are retirees who during their life in a state of retirement, on average lasting more than 20 years, pay and will still pay, again by way of personal income tax, one (other) 1 million euro, and will simultaneously receive a total net treatment not over 2 million euros, as a "social security" pension supported by contributions actually paid;
c) are therefore retirees who, as can well be understood, enjoy a treatment exceeding 5 times the minimum INPS treatment, as it is commensurate, according to state laws voted by Parliament and in force at the time of their termination from active service, both to salaries received during their professional life than to the social security contributions paid (contribution amount);
d) finally they are citizens who during their existence contribute, with the approximately 2 million paid / paid and not used personally, to ensure the various members of the national community the full enjoyment of fundamental rights such as education, health, social assistance, etc. (in this regard, it should be noted that half of Italians pay just over 3% of the income tax: they do not even pay 1,930 euros / year which is the annual per capita cost of health care!).
The design of the 2022 Budget Law, presented recently by the Government to both Houses of Parliament, correctly says nothing regarding the automatic equalization of these pensions – for 11 of the last 14 years, ie from 2008 to 2021 – have paid / granted a serious reduction of the same (even its zeroing in the years 2008, 2012 and 2013), suffering a permanent loss of purchasing power equal to no less than 15-20%.
Over this long period of more than ten years, the rulings of the Constitutional Court have intervened several times with judgments which, although wavering, nevertheless affirmed the principle that similar legislative interventions – limiting the quantum of the revaluation of pensions – must not be repeatedly re-proposed without interruption of continuity. , as, otherwise, they would constitute a vulnus / a lesion of articles 36 and 38 of the Constitutional Charter.
Parliament has placed itself in the direction / adherence to the aforementioned high rulings with the approval of Law 160/2019, whose article 1 – paragraph 478 – establishes that, starting from 1 January 2022, the automatic revaluation index of pensions it is applied according to the mechanism established by article 34, paragraph 1, of law no. 448.
I cannot here refrain from representing a truth that is little known and considered. also from the Government and Parliament, a truth that, perhaps – indeed certainly – uncomfortable, is so immanent and pervasive in the social context that it affects the highest incomes and therefore also the pensions we are dealing with; I am referring to the triple progressivity in force in our country:
Ø the first concerns the fact that the more a subject earns, the more he pays;
Ø the second (equally legitimate) progressivity is given by the increase in the tax rate, with the marginal rate at 43%;
Ø the third is a "hidden progressiveness", because it exists but is never highlighted by the proponents of tax reduction, and above all dangerous, because the more taxes you pay, the less services you receive, as in fact, as income increases, they decrease, up to disappear, the deductions, effectively encouraging citizens to declare what is really needed in order to be able to benefit from social benefits and other concessions from both the State and the Regions and Municipalities.
In my capacity as National President and Secretary General specified above, I ask that, after 14 years, the aforementioned article 34, paragraph 1, be implemented, finally restoring the validity of the three ordinary brackets:
a) 100 per cent for pension treatments up to 4 times the minimum INPS treatment;
b) 90 percent for pensions between 4 and 5 times the minimum INPS treatment;
c) 75 per cent for pensions exceeding 5 times the minimum INPS treatment.
The requested implementation constitutes a remedial act of partial or total disavowal of the vital principle of adjusting pensions to the trend in the cost of living.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/breve-storia-della-perequazione-automatica-delle-pensioni/ on Thu, 02 Dec 2021 06:43:56 +0000.