IamStu

And you accuse others of prejudice! Priceless ... well not 7k per month pension priceless

cricketman

No, not at all

As I said, it is just slightly higher than the basic pension for a couple who earn 35k euros per year each. The top 10% of households in Spain will be earning this

If you think a 35k salary in Spain is elite then I really dont know how to respond to you. It is a good salary, but nowhere near elite

scrubbedexpat095

Cman is right, the highest state Pension here is 2.5K per month and yes IME there are quite a lot of people who earn more than 35K per year

jimenato

So a couple earning only 35,000 a year each (and I agree that's not exactly huge - not much more than an average salary in the UK) get 12 * 7000 = 84,000 a year pension?

I can see why Spain is in a spot of financial difficulty.

Actually, with reference to the thread title - maybe that's why they have to exploit the young workers - to pay the pensions of the old retired ones.

cricketman

No, they get EUR60,000 pension i.e. 5k month. Roughly 85% of their last salary

Me Me was referencing my in-laws who have a small professional pension on top of that

Note that social security contributions for someone who earns over 35k per year are 750 euros per month i.e. very high. The people on here who complain about the high social security contributions need to realise that they go towards paying high pensions

My in-laws who worked on average 45 years each paid an equivalent of 800,000 euros in social security contributions over their lifetime

By the way, to get back on topic. I have met many young adults around my age in Oviedo who have moved back into their own parents old flat, refurbished it and are now living there for free - now that their parents have retired and gone back to live in the village or campo.

This makes a lot of sense, everyone benefits and they get to bring up their children in the same flat they were brought up in

rspltd

In 2010 the social security system collected 80Bn€ in contributions but paid out 82 Bn€ in pensions - something wrong there perhaps?

scrubbedexpat095

its actually 2.5x14 =35,000 x 2 = 70,000 I think Cman folks have a private pension which brings them up to 7K per month as opposed to 5K per month basic pension

jackytoo

Not sure where this is going it is beginning to sound as if these salaries are the norm. I don't think they are. One of my Spanish relatives is an eye specialist and was only getting €47,000 pa two years ago. Doubt if it has gone up much since from what I have read about hours cuts in the health and public sector jobs. I may look it up.

scrubbedexpat095

I can't speak for the health or public sectors but in the private sectors salaries between 50 and 100 K are quite common especially in the IT field.

Well TBH I only really know about the IT field

me me

I think that you have your calcs slightly wrong.

It is impossible that they paid so much in social secruity.

45, 40, 35, 30, 25 and 25 years ago, I bet that nobody, at whatever level who worked for the social secruity paid 750 a month contributions to SS.

In fact I would state that not many of them would have earned 750 euros a month 30 years ago.

jackytoo

Good point.

This may be useful. I have called it up for health workers.

http://www.salaryexplorer.com/salary...btype=2&job=13

chopera

She's an analyst not a trader but she earns over €30k and I earn about €50k. However my base salary is lower than hers so she is due a bigger state pension than me. These were good but not spectacular salaries in Madrid during the boom times. As it is illegal for companies to cut wages we've still got those salaries, if we had to look for work now we'd be lucky to get two thirds of that. What really makes a difference to us is the fact that my wife has been able to stay on her full salary while having two children - the maternity leave and "horario de madre" means that we were able to find a way around her taking unpaid leave. Other things like cheap child care, tax rebates and cheap public transport mean we don't really struggle. I tried to work it out recently, and came to the conclusion that to have a similar lifestyle in London we'd both need to be earning six figure salaries.

Going back to the state pension, I think the maximum is around €35k/year which I think corresponds to 35 years of contributions at the maximunmrate. It used to be the case that the final pension was in part calculated on the last few years of contributions, so certain people like autonomos would increase their contributions during those final years. I'm not sure if that is still the case, so maybe now you have to pay in more for more years in order to get the top pension.

There have also been cases of people being offered very generous early retirement deals with 6 figure finiquitos, even during the crisis, and even while the future retirement age was being increased. In my experience I have seen people very average jobs retire at the age of 55. This is obviously unsustainable. Many people thought that taxes on immigrants would pay for it, but the supply of them has dried up. Somebody else will have to pay.

cricketman

Yes I agree

The wife and I moved from London to Barcelona in 2007 and dropped salaries by about 20% in the process. We had a way better lifestyle in Barcelona on the lower salary than we did in London

We still earn about 20% less than we did in London (basically because my wife is looking after 2 very small children), but we live like absolute kings in Oviedo. We earn 60k euros per year now, this would probably have to be £150k to have a similar lifestyle in London i.e. 3 times as much. And I'd see my children only at weekends due to the longer working hours and longer commute each day

cricketman

I said the "equivalent of"

jackytoo

What's coming next...a scan of everyone's tax return and bank statements