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Dublin: 7 °C Thursday 23 May, 2013

When I’m 65: Irish pensioners can expect 11 healthy years (but less for men)

Irish women aged 65 can expect to live for a total of 21.1 years while men can expect an additional 18.1 years, new figures have found.

Image: Sarah Dempsey/PA

IRISH PEOPLE CAN expect to have around around 11 healthy years left once they hit 65, new research has found.

Irish pensioners also have an average life expectancy compared to other EU countries, with the figures finding Irish women aged 65 can expect to live for another 21.1 years while men aged 65 can expect 18.1 more years, research from Eurostat found.

The figures looked at the 27 EU member states and found that the average life expectancy of a 65-year-old is 21 more years.  France has the highest life expectancy for women at 23.4 more years while Switzerland has the highest number of years left for men at 19 years.

Meanwhile the shortest life expectancy at 65 for women was in Bulgaria (17 years) while for men it was Latvia (13.3 years).

The research found that Sweden had the highest number of healthy years left for both men and women at 14.1 and 15.5 years respectively.

Bad news for eastern European countries though. The figures found that women in Slovakia can expect just 2.8 healthy years left when they hit 65 while men can look forward to just 3.3 years.

Irish women aged 65 can expect to have 11.2 healthy years left while men can expect 11.1 years.

The research found that EU countries with the highest life expectancy at the age of 65 are not necessarily the same as those with the most healthy years left at 65.

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Comments (6 Comments)

  • Make that 6 or less because the retirement age is going up! As for the likes of Ivan Yates on his TDs pension of €83,000 a year and he’s only 53… well that’s another story and it is morally wrong.

    All TDs should get their ‘state’ pensions at the same time as the rest of us. It’s not like they make any of the contributions to deserve these ridiculously over the top pensions anyway.

    Follow the Real Pay campaign to help have this injustice stopped.
    More here http://www.aaronmckenna.com/real-pay/

    Reply
    • @John ‘Trips’ Gallen

      Hear, hear, well said. Why in God’s name do people like him, all of them, including aherne, Bruton, Reynolds, Burke many, many more receive that money immediately. They should be made wait until they’re 60 like everyone else. Some of them have only done a couple of years ‘serving’ the people. I laugh, ha, ha!

      It’s amazing how M Harney feels and announces that she is ‘entitled’ to her pension, she was a civil servant for years and did her job!!!!! I beg to differ Ms. Harney. YOU far from did, your job just like the rest of the grabbers before you. How dare you compare yourself to nurses, doctors etc. You are far from being similar, even on par with those people. I’d like to see you doing their job for a week.

      I see it all the time, friends, family that have worked all their lives, paid their taxes, and receive this tiny pension at the end of their working days. On a personally viewpoint some have not been able to enjoy those ’11′ years because of being unfortunate enough to be suffering from MS, parkinsons disease etc. Everybody should be able to retire at 55 if they want and collect whatever pension they’ve been paying and enjoy the last few years doing things, travelling etc. that they couldn’t before in their younger working life because they were trying to pay to live and rear children. Sad, the saying used to be “work to live”.

      Reply
    • I hear you to Sheila, but lowering the retirement age is something I would have to disagree with when speaking of the ‘state’ pensions, it is one of the contributory factors, not the biggest by a long shot, but one none the less, for the problems in Greece. Fair enough if a person has a private pension that they have for retiring at whatever age they have chosen.
      But my point is that everyone who is entitled to receive the ‘state’ pension irrespective of their position in public or private working life should receive it at the same time. No exceptions.

      And yes, Harney et al do NOT deserve the pensions they receive!

      Reply
    • Why does every story have to revert to government bashing. Keep it for the related stories. Ye are all getting pretty damn boring to listen to at this stage.

      Reply
  • Is that old woman grabbing the old man’s ass?

    Reply

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