Central Bank Governor Gregory Marchenko in favor of raising retirement age for women

Kazakhstan’s Central bank Governor Gregory Marchenko speaks up in favor of setting equal retirement age for women and men in Kazakhstan. He announced that in a recent TV show "Professionalnyi Razgovor" (“Professional Talk”) run by Ms. Zhannat Ertlessova [ex Vice Minister of Finance, ex Vice Head of President’s Administration, ex Vice Minister of Defense among other positions]. According to Mr. Marchenko, “back in 1997 the solidary pension system nearly failed: pension allowances in arrears totaled almost half a billion US Dollars, with the delay period reaching 6 months”. One of the hurdles to an effective pension system is “reluctance to understand advantages of raising the overall retirement age and of setting equal retirement age for men and women”. He emphasized that a major benefit of the accumulation pension system currently employed in Kazakhstan is that “the longer you work the more you accumulate”, adding that the applicable legislation envisages that any person may retire at the age of 55 if s/he believes the accumulations are sufficient. In an interview for KazTag Agency early March Gregory Marchenko said that “raising the retirement age for women up to 63 y.o. is an issue of gender equality (…) According to the World Bank, women live an average 20.5 years after retirement, whereas men live 12 years”.