“We have the great problem of the pay-as-you-go system, not so much that of defined contribution, but that of defined benefit, with many people receiving unfair pensions in terms of what they ended up contributing. At the extreme are development banks, Pemex and CFE, where very young people retire with generous pensions that are being a bomb for the fiscal system, “said Héctor Villarreal, general director of the Center for Economic and Budgetary Research (CIEP).
The specialist stressed that there are sectors, such as development banking, where pensions have been found for people who only worked for 10 or 15 years.
Villarreal recommended raising taxes for those with higher pensions and collaborating with the private initiative to complement the pensions provided by the federal government.
Lucía Cárdenas, Director of Economic Studies at Citibanamex, also considered the need to make adjustments or reforms to the public administration pension system.
“It could be the case that you see a more aggressive revenue side tax reform in 2022, it’s the last chance to see a more aggressive tax reform change than we have seen,” he said.
For Villarreal, another of the country’s problems is that the birth rate is falling and life expectancy is lengthening.
“When it comes to reforming this, if you do not do it carefully, governments will overthrow you, I think you have to campaign with society and we will agree,” he said. He also warned about trends in geographic composition: “The way things look, fertility rates continue to fall, the accounts are going to get very ugly,” he said.
Pablo López Sarabia, professor in the Economics department of Tecnológico de Monterrey, highlighted the importance of a fiscal reform, since the government plans to increase support for the elderly to 6,000 pesos before the end of his term.
“The government has introduced a pension program for older adults, the problem is that the government wants to double this amount and the burden it represents for the budget is not going to be an easy task, remembering that income does not grow because it does not we have done a tax reform, “he said.