The pension burden on the working-age population is increasing in Belarus. This was announced today at a press conference by Elena Kukharevich, Deputy Chairperson of the National Statistical Committee, as reported by a BELTA correspondent.
The pension burden on the working-age population is increasing in Belarus. This was announced today at a press conference by Elena Kukharevich, Deputy Chairperson of the National Statistical Committee, as reported by a BELTA correspondent.
"The main trend in the change of the age structure of the population is an increase in the proportion of the population older than working age (55 years for women, 60 years for men) and a decrease in the proportion younger than working age (0-15 years). The number of people older than working age in the total population is growing at a faster rate than the number of people younger than working age," noted Elena Kukharevich.
As of the beginning of 2015, the number of people younger than working age in the country was 1.6 million (an increase of 30.1 thousand people over the past year). The number of people older than working age at the beginning of the current year reached 2.3 million (an increase of 45.7 thousand people in 2014). Today, almost every fourth resident of the republic is older than working age, while in 2000, it was almost every fifth, stated the representative of Belstat.
The proportion of the population of working age remains quite large, although there is a tendency for it to decrease. At the beginning of the current year, the number of this age group was 5.6 million people (58.6% of the total population) and decreased by 63 thousand people over the year.
"The situation with the replenishment of labour resources appears problematic in the future," believes Elena Kukharevich. "This is due to the fact that smaller cohorts of children born in the late 1990s - early 2000s will enter working age." At the beginning of the current year, the number of 15-year-old adolescents who will reach working age in a year was 91 thousand, while the number of people leaving this age group (59-year-old men and 54-year-old women) is 142 thousand.
In the future, the imbalance will intensify even further: the number of children currently aged 10-14 is 443 thousand, while the number of people of pre-retirement age (5 years before retirement) is 720 thousand people.
A direct consequence of the demographic aging of the population is a change in the burden structure on the working-age population. The pension burden indicator per 1000 working-age individuals increased from 370 people of pre-retirement age in 2000 to 403 people in 2014. The labor force replacement rate during this period decreased from 356 persons of pre-working age to 281 people.
News of Belarus (BELTA)