Four out of 10 families have a private pension

That private pensions are a good complement to public retirement, most citizens know. Encourage those plans should be an objective of any government and with more interest if social security can no longer take over the payment of public pensions by dragging a deficit greater than 20,000 million euros and having to borrow to the State to face to his obligations

In spite of this, the executive decided to cut one of the measures that helped the most to promote private savings for retirement: the reduction of contributions. Since this year, the maximum amount deductible in the IRPF has been reduced from 8,000 to 2,000 euros, which remains a lot of taxable attitude to retirement savings products, which, of course, are not intended exclusively for large patrimonies.

The data shows it. According to the Association of Collective Investment Institutions and Pension Funds (Inverted), at the end of 2020 four out of ten Spanish households were part of their savings in individual pension plans, not counting employment plans - which are promoted by a Company or institution in which employer and worker contribute jointly and, normally, are collected in labor agreements.

Madrid is the first community in the national ranking, with 53% of households, followed by Aragon, with 52% and La Rioja, with 51%. In the last positions are Asturias, where 31% of families invest in private plans and Asturias, Extremadura and Cantabria, with 35%. Catalonia stands at 45%, something above the national average.

In total, there is 7.52 million individual pension accounts in Spain and another two million in the employment system. The average investment is 10,895 euros per saver. Navarra is the community with a greater heritage, 15,190 euros per household and Murcia, the child with 6,464 euros. The average investment in the Community of Madrid is 13,722, while in Catalonia, it amounts to 12,607 euros.

In spite of this, the reform of public pensions does not contemplate incentives for private private plans, but rather on the contrary. Airof has calculated that "70% of the fiscal benefit of private pension plans is concentrated on higher incomes", something logical because they usually reach the top of the reluctant contributions, and that earned the government to considerably lower the deduction of contributions in income tax.

Thus, as of 2021, the maximum taxable amount for investment in private pension plans has been reduced from 8,000 to 2,000 euros, which has caused a braking in investments in these products. The private pension system recorded net contributions worth 1,336 million euros by 2020, 18% more, mainly due to the remarkable increase of the gross contributions of the year. " This increase "may be related to the reduction at the maximum limit of contribution up to 2,000 euros and in force as of 2021, so that the savers could have taken advantage of the highest limits even in 2020," explains Inverco.

In fact, in the first semester of 2021, contributions to individual pension plans have fallen by 22% over the same period last year, which is 309 million less than a year earlier

Another argument used by the Executive against private plans is that they discriminate young people, who in the early years of their professional career barely have resources to save on an individual pension plan the AIROF points out that "only the employment plans, when characterized For non-discrimination by age, they cover the youngest population more effectively. "

For these reasons, one of the pension reform points presented by José Luis Escrivá last week in Congress proposes "providing stability to the current model of complementary social forecasting" promoting preferentially, "Systems based on the framework of collective bargaining ».