The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and other authorities will not take any steps to raise the retirement age. This was stated by the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine Pavlo Rozenko in his interview to the 5 Kanal, - his press office reports.
"I want to tell you that we have no fixed obligations to raise the retirement age. It is neither in the memorandum with the IMF, nor in any obligations to other institutions. I want to say that I am convinced that the current government and the authorities will not make any steps to raise the retirement age", - he said.
He recalled that raising the retirement age for women is still gradually going on. "And this is the consequence of the reform which was implemented by Yanukovych and Azarov in 2011. And, as you can see, the raising of the retirement age had no positive effect on the deficit of the Pension Fund: it has increased significantly in comparison with 2011. While it was about 1 445 649 088 USD at that time, today there is more than 5 059 771 807 USD in subsidies coming to the Pension Fund from the budget. That is, the budget deficit has not decreased as a result of raising the retirement age, but increased instead", - Pavlo Rozenko noted.
According to him, it shows that the problem of the Pension Fund is not in the question of raising the retirement age at all, but in the low incomes. "Today more than 50% of the working population do not pay taxes to the Pension Fund or pay them not in full. And we all need to understand that we pay our taxes not to the abstract state that put it in the unknown destination, we pay taxes from our wages to our families and relatives, who are now in retirement. And when the state or the authorities are asked, why do we have such low pensions, the only answer to this question lies in the fact that we have low pensions because it is not accepted for us to pay taxes honestly and in full", - he said.
"There is no and cannot be high pensions in a country where 50% of working citizens do not pay taxes or pay them not in full. There cannot be high pensions in a country, where the size of the legal wages is absolutely miserable, because the pension is a derivative of the wage. So I need to underline one more time that we expect a serious effect and additional resources to the Pension Fund of Ukraine from the increase of salaries in Ukraine, from raising the minimum wage twice – up to 115,65 USD", - Pavlo Rozenko concluded.