20130515114746522.jpg (Photo : cxjj.cinic.org.cn)
China’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security revealed that the country’s pension fund for retired State workers has reached Rmb1.83 trillion (USD300bn) in 2012, growing at a rate of 21.4% since 2003.
In an announcement published on its website, the ministry said the government is closely monitoring China's pension fund for staff members of state-owned enterprises nationwide to ensure there is adequate resources for retired workers.
China is seeing a rapid increase in the aging population and the government wants to see to it that retired workers will get their pension in due time.
To ease the strain placed on pensions by an aging population, a top pension official suggested to raise the retirement age – 60 years old for men, 55 years old for female white-collar workers and 50 years old for female manual workers.
Raising the retirement age will relieve the government’s financial burden in supporting a rapidly aging population, said the Tsinghua University, which released a proposal to delay the pension age.
The ministry released the pension fund figure as Chinese media predicted that the government will soon announce a reform of the pension system.
As of September of this year, a total of 806.6 million Chinese people have enrolled in the pension system on the mainland, the ministry said.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, the number of Chinese people of working age dropped by 3.45 million last year to bring the total to 937.27 million.
However, an overwhelming majority of the 25,000 netizens surveyed online said they oppose the proposal to increase the retirement age. The survey, conducted by the China Youth Daily and news portal Sohu, revealed that 95% of those surveyed said they were against the idea of increasing the retirement age.
About 91% of the respondents said they will not work until 65 while 60% said they would be physically incapable of working upon reaching the said age. The survey covered people aged between 24 and 53.
