A dignified life for retirees is a constitutional and universal right: A social state is urgently needed

Retirement and social security are among universal human rights. The state is mandated to fulfill this right. When we look at retirement and social security, the state is obligated to provide retirees with a basic income guarantee. A basic income guarantee, accessible health insurance, a sustainable income guarantee for their children, and a basic health and income guarantee for the elderly are the fundamental duties of the state and constitute a constitutional right.

According to the first paragraph of Article 49 of our Constitution, work is the right and duty of everyone. According to Article 56 of our Constitution, everyone has the right to live in a healthy and balanced environment.

According to Article 60 of our Constitution, everyone has the right to social security. The state is obligated to take the necessary measures to provide this security. The fundamental problem in our country is that, under the guise of health transformation, the state has abandoned the social state model and, as a result of the imposition of a "Gendarme State" mentality, has turned social security from a right into a liability.

To briefly summarize the transformation in healthcare, until the year 2000, the monthly accrual rate was 70%, and the severance pay ceiling was 7.5 times the minimum wage. In other words, a person receiving a salary of 1,000 TL at that time would receive 700 TL upon retirement. While an employee retiring in 2002 received 1,750,000 TL in severance pay, the same person retiring in 2023 receives 500,000 TL in severance pay. In 2002, a worker or employee received 838,000 USD with the severance pay they received, whereas today, a worker or employee retiring under the same conditions will receive only 25,000 USD. The severance pay ceiling is 35,000 TL today, whereas in the old system, it was 7.5 times the minimum wage. If we had been able to maintain this, a worker's severance pay ceiling today should have been 150,018 TL.

The monthly accrual rate was 55% between 2002 and 2008, but it was reduced to 35% after 2008. The number of premium days was set at 5,000, and the monthly accrual rate was pulled down to 27.7%. In fact, the fundamental problem for retirees here is the monthly accrual rate. A person who had a monthly salary of 1,000 TL in 2000 would have received 700 TL if they retired that day; if the same person retires today, they will receive 277 TL. This is exactly the problem! Unless a regulation is made regarding retroactive monthly accrual rates, the problems of retirees and their struggle to live at the hunger threshold will continue.

In the 2024 budget, an appropriation of 2.8 trillion TL was allocated for personnel expenditures. In the 2023 budget, this amount was 960 billion TL. According to this situation, personnel expenditures have been increased by 300%. In other words, wages should be increased by 300%. This is because appropriations allocated as personnel expenditures cannot be spent on other services according to the Public Financial Management and Control Law No. 5018. In this case, the lowest pension should be 2,500 TL, and the minimum wage should be 34,300 TL. When we examine this in terms of the figures in the budget, this is the reality. Increasing the lowest pension to 34,300 TL is a necessity in terms of the budget. Here, approximately 70% of our country is at the hunger threshold. That is to say, even if the minimum wage and pensions were brought to the level we mentioned, this 70% segment would still not be able to escape the hunger threshold.

So, what is the solution? The solution is for the political power to freeze prices for one year. In our country, everyone has been convinced by Neo-Liberal rhetoric that the retirement age is a problem in terms of social security. The main reasons for social security deficits appear to be the uncollected Social Security Premiums, the inability to capitalize Social Security Funds at market interest rates, and the inability to rent out the movable and immovable assets held by the Social Security Institution at market prices, which manifest as deficits of the Social Security Institution. In fact, the political power uses the social security funds itself and forces the Social Security Institution to borrow at market interest rates. These are the biggest reasons for the deficits, and the effect of raising the retirement age on social security deficits is 3%, meaning it is not as exaggerated as claimed.

When we examine this situation in terms of the active-passive ratio, while one employee finances six people in OECD countries, in our country, while one employee was financing 2.29 retirees in 2000, today one employee finances only 1.1 retirees. What is normal in countries like ours is that one employee should finance 4 people. In other words, by raising the age limit and lowering the monthly accrual rate, social security deficits have not decreased; on the contrary, they have increased. The solution is an immediate Social Welfare State.