In a context in which thousands of workers are forced to retire before the legal age, a Spanish man with more than 40 years of discounts reports a monthly loss of around 1,000 euros in his pension, after being fired and forced to retire early. The case is generating debate in Spain and raises questions that also arise in Portugal.
Nicolás Moya is 61 years old and has a contributory career spanning four decades. Despite this, the pension granted was subject to a permanent cut because he had resorted to early retirement, a decision that, according to him, was not the result of personal choice, but of the impossibility of continuing to work after being laid off.
In Spain, early retirement allows access to the pension up to four years before the normal legal age, as long as certain age requirements and years of deductions are met. However, this modality involves the application of reducing coefficients that permanently reduce the value of the pension, with monthly effects for the rest of your life, according to the digital newspaper Noticias Trabajo.
Lifetime cuts despite more than 40 years of discounts
“The reduction coefficients are simple to understand. Just look at your pension receipt and see that every month they deduct 6%, 12%, 24%, 32% or even 40%”, explains Nicolás Moya. In this specific case, a penalty of 32% was applied, which remains permanent.
According to him, this reduction translates into a significant loss every month, despite a long contributory career. “After 40 years of discounts, this is a robbery. I lose 1,000 euros every month”, he states, quoted by the same source, in a sentence that summarizes the direct impact of early retirement on monthly income.
For Nicolás Moya, there is unequal treatment between workers. The pensioner considers it unfair that those who start working later can access retirement with 100% of their pension, while long careers end up penalized by early departures that were not voluntary.
A life of work from a very early age
The pensioner recalls a professional journey that began as a child, marked by early entry into the job market. “I didn’t have a childhood or adolescence. I started working very early and, by the age of 14, I had already been a newspaper distributor, a street vendor, a painter and even a nursing assistant”, he says.
After a stint with the Legion in the Sahara and several years of work in the pharmaceutical industry, he was fired at the age of 57. From that age onwards, he explains, opportunities for professional reintegration became practically non-existent.
Unable to find a stable job, he ended up accumulating precarious jobs until he was forced to take early retirement. “At the age of 61 I was forced to retire early and they applied me a 32% cut. In my case, that means 1,000 euros less every month”, he highlights, quoted by the same source.
Cut is equivalent to almost half a salary
The amount withdrawn monthly represents, according to Nicolás Moya, “almost half a salary”, despite a lifetime of contributions. The pensioner accuses the State of creating a legal framework that legitimizes these reductions. “It’s a legal robbery. They create laws to permanently take money from us every month,” he says.
To explain what he considers to be a lack of equity, he compares the pension system to a deceptive pyramid, where citizens are forced to contribute without being able to choose alternatives. According to , the pensioner argues that the reform should work proportionally, just like the purchase of an asset, in which the effort required should be equal for all workers.
A debate that also takes place in Portugal
Although the case occurred in Spain, the situation also raises relevant questions for Portugal. In the Portuguese system, early retirement also continues to be associated with significant penalties, especially when it is not the result of long-term unemployment or a high number of years of deductions, and the cuts may continue throughout the entire pension.
In a country where many workers are removed from the market before the legal age and face difficulties in returning to work after the age of 55, Nicolás Moya’s testimony reinforces the debate on the fairness of penalty mechanisms, the protection of long careers and the risk of impoverishment in old age, an increasingly present concern also among Portuguese pensioners.
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