Answering Milli Gazete's questions regarding the pension problem in Turkey, Mahmut Şengül made important evaluations!
Many of the retirees who are victims of Turkey's economic crisis are condemned to live with an income of 7,500 TL below the hunger line.
With the regulations made in the monthly payment rates during the AK Party government, pensions have fallen to unacceptable levels in the 20-year period.
We talked about this deplorable situation of retirees with Mahmut Şengül, Chairman of the United Pensioners Union.
Answering the questions of Milli Gazete, Mahmut Şengül evaluated many issues, from retirees' loss of rights to the minimum salary that retirees should receive under Turkey's conditions.
Mahmut Şengül also talked about the work of the United Pensioners Union, Turkey's only retiree union, and listed the demands of the retirees.
Mr. Mahmut, the pensions of retirees that have been eroding for years are now a fact that all of Turkey knows. How did the average pension fall below the minimum wage in a 20-year period?
First of all, the omnibus law, which was passed in the middle of the night in 2008, manipulated the pension rates of retirees. While the salary rate for someone who retired before 2008 was 70 percent, with the law passed in 2008, the monthly salary rate was reduced to 35 percent. This again caused the salaries of those who retired after 2008 to decrease by 50 percent. In the 2000s, a retiree with the lowest pension could buy 13 quarter gold coins, or the severance pay he received when he retired was enough to buy a house where he could lay his head and avoid paying rent. However, with the policies implemented after 2002, the purchasing power of the retiree could not be protected and the retiree succumbed to high inflation. Unfortunately, the salary increases given to retirees are not calculated according to the real market inflation, but with fake inflation data, the source of which TÜİK cannot explain.
“PURCHASING POWER OF PENSIONERS NEEDS TO BE PROTECTED”
Well, sir, considering today's conditions, what do you think the minimum pension should be?
First of all, we retirees know that under today's inflation conditions, no matter how much raise we receive, the salaries will evaporate after a month before they reach the pensioners' pockets. For this reason, along with the increase, the purchasing power of the retiree must also be protected. For example, the lowest wage definition in our country is minimum wage. The institution that determines the minimum wage is the Social Security Institution and the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, which are the employers of retirees. When the Social Security Institution, which determines the minimum wage, detects an institution employing workers below this wage, it takes penal action, saying that paying wages below the minimum wage is a crime. However, the same SSI is committing a crime by paying salaries below the minimum wage to approximately 10 million retirees.
“WE DEMAND THE ABOLISHMENT OF CONTRIBUTIONS IN HEALTH”
As the United Pensioners Union, what are your demands for retirees?
First of all, along with salary increases, retirees also have other problems. As you know, we are in the age where we need health the most due to our age. However, the contribution deducted for health and medicine seriously affects the retiree's budget. We demand that the co-payment for health be abolished and that health be accessible. Again, 20 years ago, the lowest pension was 40 percent more than the minimum wage, and today the lowest pension is 7,500 TL. There are also widows and orphans who receive salaries below this figure. The minimum wage is 11,402 TL, and when we add 40 percent to this, a figure of approximately 15,000 TL comes out. In other words, if the retiree had not received any raise until today and his purchasing power had been preserved, the lowest pension today would be 15,500 TL. We do not want handouts, we want reward for our labor that we have worked for years and paid taxes in advance.