Un estudio en torno a la edad de jubilación

This paper analyses the rise in the retirement age. This is a practice that the European Union has been proposing to member States for some years, among other measures, in order to preserve the financial equilibrium of the various public social security systems. Thus, many European countries, such as France and Spain, have decided to raise the retirement age in their jurisdictions, not without controversy. Others, like Italy and Greece, have been forced to raise it after sentences by the European Court of justice, at least in part. The study starts from the pensions reform introduced in 2011 in Spain, whose main, or perhaps most notorious, feature was the rise in the mandatory retirement age. At this time, it has stopped trying to encourage the voluntary delay in retirement beyond 65 and, as we say in the jargon of bullfighting, the Spanish government “has taken the bull by the horns” raising the retirement age, although the charge (of this bull) has not been as strong as initially expected. However, with this reform the Spanish legislature has only started a process which, in my view, needs revision since the beginning. For example, the legislature has not considered regulating, or rather has avoided regulating, what will happen in this new framework, with the difficulties of employability of older workers or the institution of compulsory retirement. All these issues will be discussed throughout this study from a comparative perspective, limited to the European countries closest to Spain. The aim of this study is first to present the problems caused by a rise in the retirement age on its own, without considering other aspects, such as possible discrimination on grounds of age or even gender. Secondly, to analyse the justification for the rise, especially in the Spanish context.