The World Bank suggests Uzbekistan consider raising the retirement age in the long term. The report notes that the increase in the number of older adults is putting pressure on the pension system, which makes it necessary to reform it.
As per the report, Uzbekistan is the only former Soviet republic where the retirement age is 55 for women and 60 for men. Many countries increased the retirement age by two to three years during the transition reforms of the 1990s. However, with the advent of the second wave in the second decade of the 2000s, some countries embarked on long-delayed pension age reforms (Ukraine, Belarus, Russia).
The best option would be to decide, within the framework of the National Social Protection Strategy 2021-2030, to increase the retirement age slowly (3-4 months per year) to 65 years from 2025. In the future, this will gradually move the boundary between working and retirement age, reducing the pressure of demographic changes. It is essential for the country to have time to do this before the potential demographic growth of the labor force (the mid-2040s), as it is already a matter of national competitiveness, the World Bank experts note.
The growing demographic burden calls for early action to reform the pension system. As a result, the ratio of contributors to old-age pensioners is likely to decline from the current 2:1 to 1:1 by 2030, as shown in the report.
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