In the US Social Security’s ‘just a floor’: In Finland Saunas are Hot, Retirement is Cool

By Dave Lindorff

Helsinki—Mikko Kautto, impeccable in a blue suit and open-collared shirt, was sitting at a table in the cafeteria of the modern Centre for Pensions building on the outskirts of Finland’s capital city, answering questions about the operation of his Nordic country’s retirement system.

How, he was asked, does Finland—with its own graying bulge of Baby Boomers, low immigration rate and low birth rate—plan to deal with its version of the impending global retirement crisis?

Kautto, the director of research at the Centre for Pensions, looked surprised and a bit bemused. “We don’t see it as a crisis,” he said. “We see it as having a lot of older citizens that we need to make sure have a comfortable retirement, and we have been planning for that for years. It’s certainly a challenge, but it’s not a crisis.”

If Finland finds itself more confident than the U.S. in the face of the Boomer retirement wave, it’s not because their demographics are more favorable. More than a quarter of the country’s 5.4 million people are already over age 60 and almost five percent are over age 80, compared to 19.1% over age 60 and 3.8% over age 80 in the U.S. Life expectancy at birth in Finland is about 80 years. In the U.S., it’s about 79 years.

The difference may simply involve better planning and less-politicized public discourse...

For the rest of this article by DAVE LINDORFF, please go to: www.thiscantbehappening.net/node/2042