The Reality of Japan’s Public Pension in Practice (2) — The Truth About the “100-Year Secure Pension”

(Let us stress at the outset that the Pension Future Forum

is not posting this piece in order to provoke conflict

between members of the National Pension

and members of the Government Employees Pension and the Private School Teachers Pension.

That is not the intention.

We post this content simply in the spirit of asking that people

grasp the realities properly, at the very least,

before taking part in the pension debate.)

In 2004, under the motto of a “100-year secure pension,”

Japan put reform into practice; this is part of the reality of that pension.

“School principals and university professors in Japan,

who were covered by a relatively generous pension before the reform, receive

about 2.2 to 2.3 million won a month.

Following the 2004 reform under Prime Minister Koizumi,

which raised the contribution level from around 13% to 18.3%,

a university professor’s pension is about 1.5 million won a month,

and the pension of an average workplace-based member

is about 1.3 million won a month.

This is also consistent with the officially published data

of Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.

A great many malicious comments denying this reality

have been posted on this YouTube video.

Before posting comments, please first check

whether the facts are as stated.

(For comparison of Korean and Japanese

pension payment amounts,

15 screens have been captured and attached.)

(The claim, raised as an issue by Korea’s government employees’ unions and others,

that Japanese civil servants receive far larger

retirement allowances

than Korean civil servants do

also distorts the facts.

According to material confirmed directly by Junichi Sakamoto, adviser and

former Director of the Actuarial Affairs Division of Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare,

at the request of Yun Suk-myung, Research Fellow Emeritus

at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs,

Japan’s National Personnel Authority,

even after the fact,

each year

operates the retirement allowance so that it is 100% identical to

the pay at Japanese workplaces with 50 or more employees, the benchmark for civil servants’ retirement allowances —

that is the reason!)