Just making ends meet

年金改革関連法案の行方

The three-party agreement says a subcommittee will be created in both houses of the Diet to review the social security system, including the issue of pension integration. The panel is to "reach a conclusion" by March 2007, but there is no guarantee that it will decide in favor of integration; nor is it clear exactly what integration means.

The pension debate remains confused and the public is growing uneasy over where it will lead. Adding to the unease is the failure of Diet members, including Cabinet ministers, to pay into the obligatory national pension fund. About the only certainty is that the package, expected to pass the Diet by mid-June, is designed to make ends meet by raising premiums and reducing benefits over the long haul.

What needs to be done to jump-start a more constructive pension debate? For starters, the lingering pension scandal — which has led to the resignations of two political leaders from their respective government and party posts — should be resolved. For that, all members of the Diet should come clean by publishing their records on premium payments.

The scandal has made two things clear. First, many legislators were unfamiliar with the national pension program, which applies to all Japanese citizens of working age. Second, the program is financially bankrupt because premium revenues are falling far short of pension payouts. Two reasons are given for this: the growing number of retirees and the high level of premium defaults.

Premium defaults among Diet members represent the tip of the iceberg. Statistics show that nearly 40 percent of working-age people, including the unemployed and self-employed, do not contribute to the fund. The pension fiasco, however, has exposed a special privilege enjoyed by legislators, who receive annual pensions of more than ¥4 million for 10 years of service. By contrast, national pensions amount to less than ¥800,000 a year even if premiums are paid for 40 years.

The sense of unfairness seems compounded by the fact that corporate workers, civil servants and private schoolteachers have their pension premiums withheld at the source. So there is no way they can skip their payments. This means that they are effectively making up part of the shortfalls in the national fund. Their burdens will rise if defaults widen.

That is a serious flaw in the fund, yet many Diet members do not seem seriously concerned about the problem. Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi seemed to echo the sentiment among legislators when he said, "If you don't pay premiums you won't get pensions." That is obvious, but what does he think of the fact that there are so many people who just don't pay premiums?

At this rate, the government may find it impossible to pay pensions as promised. The practice of collecting premiums only from those who are able or willing to pay, such as workers on payrolls, no longer suffices. Something must be done about those who default on payments.

This is a question that should be addressed by the planned pension subcommittee. Of course, there are other questions that need to be thrashed out to build a better, fairer pension system. Legislators can and should take the initiative by setting an example: by paring their privileged pensions and incorporating them in the pension program for either corporate employees or civil servants. The idea is to equalize premium rates and benefit levels with those of private and public workers.

Scrapping the privileges may be difficult given the special status of Diet members, but joining these funds would help lawmakers understand better how ordinary citizens feel about life in retirement. It might also help induce the vast numbers of delinquent contributors to change their minds.

The Japan Times Weekly
May 22, 2004
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     3党は年金一元化を含む社会保障全般の見直しのため、衆参両院に小委員会を設けることに合意した。小委員会は2007年3月までに結論を得る予定だが、一元化を支持する保証はない。

      年金改革に関する議論は混乱しており、国民はその行方を憂慮している。混乱に輪をかけるように、閣僚を含む多くの国会議員の国民年金保険料未納が発覚した。はっきりしているのは、年金改革関連法案は、長期にわたって保険料を引き上げ、給付を引き下げて収支を合わせることを目的としていることだ。

      建設的な年金論議を進めるには、まず保険料未納問題を解決しなければならない。そのために、全議員が自身の保険料支払い状況を公表すべきだ。

      保険料未納問題は、多くの議員が年金制度を理解していないこと、定年退職者の増加と未納問題のため、制度が破綻していることを浮き彫りにした。年金保険料支払い義務のある国民のうち40%近くが義務を怠っている。

      議員年金では10年間の在籍者が年に400万円の給付を受けることができる。国民年金は保険料を40年間払っても80万円以下にしかならない。

      民間企業労働者、公務員、私立学校職員は年金保険料を源泉徴収されており、結果的に国民年金制度の赤字を負担させられている。

      小泉首相は「保険料を払わなければ年金がもらえないだけだ」というが、保険料未納者がこれだけ多いことを何と考えているのか。

      国会議員は、厚生年金か共済年金制度に加入し、民間労働者や公務員と、保険料、給付水準を同等にすべきだ。年金制度一元化により、議員は一般国民の老後についての考えが分かり、多数の保険料未納者は考えを変えることを迫られるだろう。