Office workers also using early retirement scheme for physically taxing professions

The current scheme for early retirement in physically taxing professions is also being used by office workers at libraries, insurers, and town halls, AD reports based on figures from the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment.

The current early retirement scheme (RVU) is expiring next year. Trade unions in various sectors have been campaigning for months for a decent replacement. This week, cleaners, city transport, and national and regional public transport all went on strike. The police are also protesting by not deploying officers to the Ajax vs. FC Utrecht match in Amsterdam on Sunday, resulting in its cancelation, or a planned highway blockade by climate activists from Extinction Rebellion in The Hague on Saturday.

The RVU was introduced in 2022 to give people in physically demanding jobs the chance of a healthy retirement despite the ever-increasing state pension age. At the time, it was agreed that the scheme would be temporary and that unions would draw up a list of physically taxing jobs that could be helped with a separate scheme in the future, according to AD. That list never came about because it proved impossible to determine from above what work was physically demanding.

Minister Eddy van Hijum of Social Affairs (NSC) is working on a new scheme, but he wants to design it so that it is not abused by people with office jobs. “The current scheme is also used by people who, with the best will in the world, cannot be said to have a heavy job, such as office workers at banks and insurance companies,” someone involved in the negotiations told AD.

Van Hijum submitted a proposal to the trade unions last week, but they rejected it. According to the union, there is still too much distance between their demands and what the government is prepared to offer.