"There is no money"

When will pensions be canceled in Russia?

Sergey Medvedev: To many Russians, the future future is in a rather dangerous, undesirable appearance, in the form of various announcements about what will happen to their pensions. If you look at the public statements that sound in the past few months, then increasing the retirement age and the abolition of the funded part of the pension, and the question of the fact that there will be no indexation of pension payments is discussed. That is, something strange and undesirable is happening to the pensions of Russians.

Our guest is a person who believes that there will be no pensions in the future at all. This is Vladimir Nazarov , director of the research financial institution at the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation .

In Soviet times, they said that the next generation of people will live under communism. And the next generation of Russian people will live without pensions.

The locating generation of Russian people will live without pensions

Let's first outline the problem itself. As I understand it, this is a problem of aging. In Russia, this has already reached the level that one worker contains one pensioner?

Vladimir Nazarov: No, we have not yet reached this level, so far we have 1.3 people for one pensioner, for whom the employer fully pays insurance contributions to the Pension Fund. We will come to the ratio of one to one in the mid-2020s.

Sergey Medvedev: In Western countries, in my opinion, more?

Vladimir Nazarov: Of course, no. The distribution system, which works on almost our entire planet, cannot more or less stable with a ratio worse than two to one, that is, at least two workers should account for one pensioner. If your ratio is worse, then this system begins to experience big problems, of which almost all countries come out by raising the retirement age.

Sergey Medvedev: But what about the growth of labor productivity and the fact that now people are starting to just give out money - all these "helicopters" and other things?

So far, we have 1.3 people for one pensioner, for whom the employer fully pays insurance premiums to the Pension Fund

Vladimir Nazarov: An increase in labor productivity is an excellent thing in the fight against poverty. You can really provide one or another level of income to significant segments of the population, this is not a big problem. The problem of the pension system is different. She promised not only the fight against poverty, she in developed countries, and in Russia, too, promised to replace lost earnings, but she cannot cope with this. Whatever labor productivity you have, the ratio of working citizens and those who receive a pension is still critical.

Sergey Medvedev: In Russia, is this problem even more than in the rest of the world? I understand that Russia has distribution pensions, but Russia is generally a distribution state, there is a distribution principle of the budget, and the issue of pensions and pensioners is a huge political issue.

Vladimir Nazarov: Moreover, I am absolutely sure that in the elections of 2024 we have half of the voting electorate will be pensioners.

Sergey Medvedev: How in this regard now to do the ruling regime, the Ministry of Finance, the State Duma, the President?

Vladimir Nazarov: Unfortunately, we drove ourselves a little in a dead end, because we delayed pension reform for a very long time. In a good way, in 2002, we had to announce an increase in the retirement age and in 2007 to begin to increase it. That is, we, relatively speaking, were late for at least ten years, but most likely more. It is difficult, but these reforms must be carried out, without them we will not go anywhere.

But they need to be carried out, explaining to people that this is not done in order to take away something from pensioners and spend it on palaces or yachts, and this is done in the interests of the most needy segments. After all, our people, the military, the police retire at 43, 45 years old, women at 55, and at the same time everyone works massively, receive more or less good salaries-who is worse, who is better. But 80-year-olds in our country do not work in our country, their pensions are really low, these pensions are not enough for a living. If for people of the age of 55–60, a pension is such a bonus for wages: “We work, oh, how great, I am 55 years old, and the state also gave me such an increase”, who refuses 10-15 thousand rubles? Nobody. Fine. But this is not a matter of life and death.

In the elections of 2024, we have half of the voting electorate will be pensioners

And a person who is more than 70 cannot physically work. Or is it a lonely person, and he lacks for medicine ... These people are in a monstrous position. We, smearing porridge on a plate, actually do not achieve the main goal - the fight against poverty, and this is important. It seems to me that if you explain to people and really spend money on drug insurance and raising pensions to more elderly pensioners, then people will understand.

Sergey Medvedev: That is, in your opinion, it should be-raising the retirement age and getting rid of double earnings (we are talking about people who earn and at the same time receive a pension)?

Vladimir Nazarov: Yes, a very mild increase in the retirement age, a gradual and the same soft deliverance from double earnings. We have a category of people who clearly does not work from a good life, for them it is also a means of combating poverty. And if we immediately, from January 1, deprive all working pensions, this will lead to very unpleasant consequences, many will begin to work in the shadows, many will slide down on the poverty line. Therefore, you can choose certain categories of citizens: for example, teachers and doctors are protected by presidential decrees, in accordance with these decrees, their wages are pulled under average wages, that is, it is clearly not the most disadvantaged, and it can be tougher: yes, if you work in a budgetary institution by teachers or doctors, then you do not receive a pension. The same thing with the military, with civil servants - for civil servants has already done this. The rest of the people are not so high pensions. It seems to me that the decision that was made this year is about not indexing pensions to working pensioners - this is something as cruel as possible that can be done in relation to most categories of the population.

Sergey Medvedev: I heard that there is an idea of refusing pensions to those who work: if state and municipal employees receive earnings at the main place of work, then they do not pay a pension.

Vladimir Nazarov: Yes, this law has already been adopted.

Sergey Medvedev: And the second that if a person earns more than a million a year, then a pension is also not due to him either.

For people of 55–60 years of age, a pension is such a bonus for wages

Vladimir Nazarov: This idea has not passed. This was one of the ideas that experts offered not to pay a pension or at least part of the pension to millionaires. But, unfortunately, it turned out that there are a lot of millionaires among a number of decisions and close to them. If you have a regular pension, ten to fifteen thousand rubles, then it is uncritical for you. Moreover, we do not have many these people, after 40 thousand rubles, the pyramid of wages is no longer a pyramid, but a certain antenna, there is a radical increase. I get 83 thousand, people who receive exactly 83 are very few, everything is stretched vertically, many receive much more, many - much less. That is, the bulk does not fall under this decision, and for everyone else it is insensitive.

Sergey Medvedev: What to do with pensions for the military? I am once again trying to tie this to the socio-economic structure of Russian society, where one hundred million state employees (these are cordon’s statistics), if you look not at state employees in a pure form, but on all state payments, that is, people working in the budget system, plus pensioners, plus the entire estate of power, plus a huge power corporation.

Vladimir Nazarov: Almost every household has either a pensioner or a state employee, that is, in almost every household we will easily find some state income.

Sergey Medvedev: Do these people use benefits that the state will no longer be able to provide?

A very soft increase in the retirement age, a gradual and the same soft getting rid of double earnings

Vladimir Nazarov: In fact-yes, but there should be a gradual coagulation of these benefits in exchange for something. Unfortunately, we have already missed part of these exchanges. When the presidential decrees were accepted on raising wages to teachers and doctors, it would not be bad to resolve this issue of double payments for working teachers and doctors: guys, they raise your wages, but in exchange they take the benefit that was given in the 90s, exactly when you had practically no salaries. Then an early pension was introduced for teachers and doctors in order to at least somehow keep people in schools and hospitals so that they would not run away. This carrot was hanged: guys, you have the right to retire earlier than the rest, receive a pension, most importantly, wait, wait, the state will give you something.

But this is not the most effective solution. A person teaches children-this is great, for this you need to pay money, and not for the fact that he has reached 45 years of age. We are happy for him, we must congratulate him on his birthday, wish it all the best, but this does not mean that we need to rush with the whole society and give him some kind of manual, which, rather, is focused on the least secured citizens.

Sergey Medvedev: What about various corporate, military pensions? These are millions and millions of people, if you take a huge detachment of security forces.

Ineffective people in a new society are not needed

Vladimir Nazarov: About three million pensioners receive this kind of pension. Few people talk about this, the Pension Fund says: "These are not my people, I have nothing to do with them, this is the Ministry of Defense." And when pension issues are being discussed, for some reason they forget about them all the time, but this is a really huge army that receives much more money than other people. In a good way, their package also needs to be resettled, because they continue to work for the mass.

Vladimir Nazarov

When retiring at the age of 40, few live for it, everyone works somewhere and many, by the way, work very well. They need to apply a differentiated approach to them. Anyone who really undermined his health in military service must retire in disability, that is, if he can no longer work, then you must really pay normally to the person who has served for his country, undermined health, cannot work, he needs a decent disability pension. But if he continues to work, then you need to spend money on its retraining, you need to give him a good weekend allowance, but not a pension. He continues to work, he is a normal member of society, what does the pension have to do with it?

Sergey Medvedev: That is, we should, apparently, about retraining people, especially the military?

A person teaches children-you have to pay money for this, and not for the fact that he has reached the age of 45

Vladimir Nazarov: This is a qualitatively different social package. No need to throw people out into the street, but you need to understand what a person needs. If this is retraining in education, then there must be special courses, green light in all universities, educational loans. Pensions are still a strongly outdated institution.

Sergey Medvedev: Vladimir, in your articles I read that by 2070 the Russians would live without a pension ...

Vladimir Nazarov: At first we will see how it works in developed countries.

Sergey Medvedev: The whole world goes to the rejection of pensions?

Vladimir Nazarov: The whole world will be forced to come to this, because it is reduced both by the ability to contain such a pension system and the need for it.

Sergey Medvedev: That is, those born in the last decade will not know what a pension is?

Vladimir Nazarov: I'm absolutely sure of that. In any case, this can be said about developed countries guaranteed.

Sergey Medvedev: Is a pension generally a temporary phenomenon that existed only in an industrial society?

Retired at the age of 40, few live for it, everyone works somewhere

Vladimir Nazarov: Yes, this is so. He was not in an agrarian society, because there were children analogue of pensions, the family supported people. In an industrial society, when a person was torn from the ground, there really was a need to create such a pension system. But it was a completely different society, then people were mainly engaged in physical, and not mental work. It was clear that in Germany in 1889 a person at 70, as a rule, could not stand at the machine - this understanding was very firm, so the retirement age was 70 years.

Germany was a pioneer in the creation of this kind of distribution system. The reason was that they fought with the socialists, tried to strengthen the role of German statehood in protecting the workers, and intercept the agenda. Now it is becoming less relevant.

We do not know when a person turns out to be unclaimed in the labor market, that is, he can lose their ability to work at a much earlier age, and can be in demand up to a hundred years. Moreover, modern methods of medicine allow you to return a person to the labor market again, to extend its ability to work.

It is reduced both by the ability to contain such a pension system and the need for it

The same thing is said about education. Previously, a person studied at school, then, relatively speaking, he went to the factory, education almost ended, and now a person is studying all his life. The continuity of education allows him to extend his work.

It is clear that these are very gradual processes. Relatively speaking, for the professor in Cambridge what I spoke about, for a long time reality, for him a pension is meaninglessness, the rudiment of the old era. The person who works at the factory in some Pikalevo, of course, what I said can cause rejection. Or metallurgical production-it still stands in this hot workshop, inhales all these smokes, is poisoned, his health will be undermined. But there will be less and fewer such industries every year, and the share of such people in the population will also decrease. Therefore, on long horizons, if we speak in the future until 2075, in the least developed countries this will be deviated.

Sergey Medvedev: How will it look? At the same time, the process of expanding the active activity of a person will go, that is, a person will be active in 55, 65, and at 75, and God forbid, at 85? Will it be a society of the third age working elderly?

For a professor in Cambridge, a pension is meaningless, rudiment of the old era

Vladimir Nazarov: Moreover, from some point, they will physiologically differ from the younger ones due to the development of medical technologies. Already now, looking at people in Western countries or simply at people who follow themselves, we do not see a crazy difference of 80-year-olds and 60 years, at 80, many look like in 60. I have such a joke: what is the difference between an agrarian society from industrial and post-industrial? In agrarian, a dream was to eat up, in the industrial - to buy a good car, and in post -industrial - to look at the age of 100 at 60.

Sergey Medvedev: The integration of people into labor is increasingly going on. Will there be so much work? The army of elderly people who suddenly will be thrown back on labor, there will be what to do? One of the tasks of the pension is that people are consumer society. Consumption is being pumped, but the problem of unemployment is also solved.

Vladimir Nazarov: There is such an intellectual trap, but this is not so. The whole story showed that our scientific and technological progress periodically displaces people from some spheres. The first example, when it was bright - "sheep ate people" in the UK. When the agrarian work of people on arable land became very ineffective, it was effective to make all these arable lands, launch sheep there and make excellent English textiles. The masses of people were driven from these lands as a result of fencing. We see that then these people found use in factories and factories, that is, they did not disappear.

Sergey Medvedev: The same progress invents new spheres of human activity.

In an agrarian society, the dream was to eat up, in the industrial - to buy a good car, and in post -industrial - to look at the age of 100 at 60

Vladimir Nazarov: That's right. What you talked about was happening in the 60–70s in developed countries. There were uprisings of youth, who could not put themselves anywhere, the governments also did not understand what to do in this situation. Some not quite smart governments did exactly what you said - they reduced the retirement age, trying to push the elderly from the labor market so that the youth would take their place.

Sergey Medvedev: Very large reputables gave the elderly ... I lived in Germany for some time, there the contingent of the owners of the "Mercedes" is pensioners. Как мне рассказали, человек, выходя на пенсию, с первой большой выплаты берет даже иногда не кредитный автомобиль, а как некую долгосрочную инвестицию покупает тот самый символический "Мерседес". Складывается структура общества, где государство просто закачивает деньги в пожилых людей, чтобы они не мешали и потребляли.

Владимир Назаров: Но, как показала практика, это ни к чему не привело: там, где была высокая безработица, она высокой и осталась. Не пенсионный возраст определяет безработицу. Исследования показывают, что у пожилых и молодых разные компетенции, их занятость локализуется в разных сферах. Прямого замещения нет: если сейчас всех пожилых задержать на рынке труда, то увеличения молодежной безработицы не произойдет. И наоборот – если выгнать всех пожилых на пенсию, то молодежная безработица сразу не исчезнет. Но все ваши меры, которые направлены на такое регулирование рынка труда, будут приводить только к одному – у вас будут падать темпы экономического роста.

Сергей Медведев: Давайте еще раз представим будущее, где человек через 40-50 лет работает до гробовой доски, до последнего дня своей жизни. Что может в данном случае обеспечить ему государство – медицинские страховки или что-то еще?

Не пенсионный возраст определяет безработицу. Исследования показывают, что у пожилых и молодых разные компетенции, их занятость локализуется в разных сферах

Vladimir Nazarov: Yes. В ближайшие полстолетия медицинское страхование будет гораздо более актуальным, чем пенсионное, потому что по медицинскому страхованию риски гораздо больше и они менее прогнозируемы для человека. В части пенсионного обеспечения человек может планировать, понимать, что если он ведет нормальный образ жизни, не ссорится со своими родными, работает, повышает свою квалификацию, то, в принципе, он может работать сколь угодно долго. Если же он захочет сделать какой-то перерыв, то он знает свой уровень потребления и может копить, если он более-менее обеспечен.

Более богатое общество уже накапливает некоторые ресурсы. Когда в развитых странах люди выходят на пенсию, некоторые из них имеют и собственные неплохие сбережения.

А в здравоохранении риски абсолютно непредсказуемы. Сегодня вы – более-менее здоровый человек, а завтра вам нужна операция на миллион долларов. Здесь, конечно, нужно вмешательство общества, страховых организаций в помощь людям – это будет очень актуально. Поэтому, на мой взгляд, акцент в ближайшие 50 лет действительно будет смещаться, пенсионная сфера будет сжиматься, а сфера здравоохранения – наоборот, разрастаться, потому что потребностей в этих технологиях будет все больше и больше.

Сергей Медведев: Соответственно, роль государства как регулятора будет заключаться в том, чтобы обеспечивать медицинскую страховку?

Владимир Назаров: Да, роль государства именно в том, чтобы обеспечить трудоспособность человека как можно дольше. Государство будет сосредотачиваться именно на этом.

В ближайшие 50 лет пенсионная сфера будет сжиматься, а сфера здравоохранения – разрастаться

В каких-то экстренных случаях это действительно страховка от бедности в случае нетрудоспособности. Если человеку ничего не удалось сберечь, ничему не удалось научиться, плохое здоровье, все плохо, детей нет, то, конечно, такому человеку нужно прийти на помощь. Но это именно страховка от бедности в случае нетрудоспособности – это радикально другие деньги, это дешево. Сейчас в некоторых развитых странах это артикулируют как гарантированный доход. Идея гарантированного дохода разыгрывается не только ультрасоциалистами-популистами, но и вполне вменяемыми людьми именно как способ заменить целый ряд льгот, пособий, которые стимулируют человека к чему бы то ни было, на такой гарантированный доход, чтобы человек был спокоен, что если с ним случится что-то плохое, то о нем позаботятся, а все, что сверх, – сам кузнец своего счастья.

Сергей Медведев: У вас пару раз прозвучало слово "семья". Я думаю, что это осталось совсем в прошлом, в аграрном обществе, когда человек по старости мог рассчитывать на помощь семьи. Сейчас со всеми новыми тенденциями распада традиционной семьи – свободный гражданский брак, дети рано уходят из дома – человек больше не может полагаться на семью.

В постиндустриальную эпоху семья будет крайне востребованным институтом

Владимир Назаров: Мне кажется, что индустриальное общество было противником семьи, а постиндустриальное общество дает нам свободу, дает выбор. В постиндустриальном обществе традиционная семья имеет гораздо больше шансов выжить и процветать, чем в индустриальную эпоху. Я думаю, что в постиндустриальную эпоху семья будет крайне востребованным институтом.

Сергей Медведев: В том числе – как социальное страхование?

Vladimir Nazarov: Yes.

Сергей Медведев: То есть мы возвращаемся к старой модели, когда пожилые родители живут за счет своих детей?

Владимир Назаров: Скорее, отдельные члены семьи – за счет друг друга в разные периоды. Кому-то надо переобучиться – этому человеку может быть и 80 лет, а в это время его 50-летние дети постоянно работают – почему не скинуться на переобучение 80-летнего отца? Равно как и первый взнос на образование, на образовательный кредит вносится родителями. У детей вряд ли есть накопления, чтобы сделать этот взнос, если мы перейдем на кредитную схему образования.

Сергей Медведев: То, что вы говорите, для очень многих звучит как пугающая перспектива: работал-работал человек всю жизнь, а в 80 лет еще надо будет переучиваться и искать новую работу…

Та работа, которая ассоциируется у нас со словом "рабство", уходит в прошлое. В будущем будет востребована только работа, приносящая удовольствие

Владимир Назаров: Та работа, которая ассоциируется у нас со словом "рабство", тоже уходит в прошлое. В будущем будет востребована только работа, приносящая удовольствие, потому что если вы получаете удовольствие от своей работы, то вы можете быть наиболее эффективным. А неэффективные люди в новом обществе не нужны. Так что это будет общество счастливых работников.

Сергей Медведев: "Неэффективные люди в новом обществе не нужны" – звучит страшновато. А вдруг судьба – доведется оказаться неэффективным человеком?

Владимир Назаров: Тогда вам помогут пособием по бедности в случае нетрудоспособности, это гарантированный доход.

Сергей Медведев: Это либеральные идеи?

Владимир Назаров: Это компромисс ультралибертарианской мысли с нашей постсоветской действительностью…

Сергей Медведев: …которая рождает нынешние форматы демонтажа советского социального государства и интересные перспективы, открывающиеся нынешним и будущим пенсионерам.