Retirement age increase in 2025 seems unlikely as life expectancy stagnates

A new forecast by Statistics Netherlands on the life expectancy of 65-year-old Netherlands residents shows that in 2025 they will still have around 20.75 years to live, half a week more than the previous forecast. The life expectancy is a month more in 2025 than in 2024.

The state retirement age is linked to these life expectancy figures. As the difference between the life expectancy in 2024 and 2025 is small at only a month, it seems unlikely that the retirement age will increase in 2025, according to NRC. Retirement age will reach the age of 67 for the first time in 2024.

In the Rutte III coalition agreement the government parties agreed that the retirement age will increase in the coming years from 66 years and 4 months in 2020 to 67 years in 2024, according to AD. The Dutch Senate and lower house of parliament both already agreed to this increase.

The life expectancy of 65-year-old Netherlands residents has been increasing since 1950, when 65-year-olds still had 14.3 years to live. The life expectancy stagnated somewhat from 2014, due to a higher mortality rate from flu epidemics, among other things.