Labor market
So many pensioners work – even without an “active pension”
Working in retirement is no longer unusual. More than one in ten retirees are now still employed – often part-time
Anyone who continues to work voluntarily after retirement age should be able to earn up to 2,000 euros tax-free from next year – but many people are already working without this.”Active pension“continues in old age. Last year, 13 percent of pensioners aged 65 and over in this country were employed, as the Federal Statistical Office in Wiesbaden announced on Tuesday. Men with old-age pensions (16 percent) were more likely to still have a job than women (ten percent).
Pension and work – often part-time
As a rule, pensioners work reduced hours: 39 percent of 65 to 74 year olds with a job in addition to their old age pension worked less than ten hours a week, according to the statistics office. 26 percent worked for ten to less than 20 hours a week, twelve percent for 20 to 30 hours a week and nine percent for 30 to less than 40 hours.
But there are also pensioners with a working week of more than 40 hours – 14 percent, including mainly self-employed people. The active pension planned by the government is not intended for them.
The statistics also show that it is primarily pensioners with a higher level of education who are still working – their share is 18 percent. For pensioners with a medium and low level of education, the proportion is eleven and ten percent respectively.
The proportion of employed people is highest among “young pensioners” aged 65 to 66 at 18 percent. As you get older, the proportion continues to decrease – for pensioners aged 73 to 74 it is only eight percent.
The statistics office’s information comes from the 2024 microcensus, a sample survey in which around one percent of the population in Germany is questioned.
“Active pension” is intended to create a tax incentive
The federal government wants to introduce active pensions from 2026 and thus create “more incentives for voluntary work in retirement age” and counteract the shortage of skilled workers. In its draft law, the Ministry of Finance assumes around 168,000 interested parties per year – meaning that one in four eligible people would actually accept the offer of an active pension when they reach retirement age. Economic experts expressed skepticism. The German Economic Institute also criticized the unequal tax treatment towards the self-employed, saying that this could potentially be legally challenged.
According to a representative survey by the YouGov Institute, 54 percent of German adults would be willing to work beyond the statutory retirement age. 33 percent would not, 13 percent answered undecided. This data was collected at the end of May 2025.
fd/AFP
Source: Stern
