Coneval foresees a crisis in the payment of pensions for the elderly in 2030

Enrique Mendez

Newspaper La Jornada
Tuesday February 14, 2023, p. eleven

The National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval) asked the Chamber of Deputies to define how the pension for adults over 65 years of age will be financed in the future, because by 2030, the population of that age will increase and there the breaking point will be triggered.

In a workshop on operating rules, the executive secretary of CONEVAL, José Nabor Cruz Marcelo, said that since it is a constitutional right, the pension must continue in the following six-year term, but with a much larger amount of resources.

During the session, in a Chamber room, in which legislators participated, he cited that the council’s estimates conclude that, between 2018 and 2020, the only population group in which a percentage decrease in a situation of multidimensional poverty was reported was those over 65 years of age. “We went from 43 percent in 2018 to 38 percent in 2020, even in the context of the pandemic and the economic contraction of that year.

A social development policy is reflected there; however, we have begun to suggest that it is important and, above all, that the Chamber consider an analysis of the financing of this program in future years”.

In the next six-year term, he said, the population that is now 60 years old will have the right to a pension and Greater reflections will be required on the financing and scope of this type of universal programs.

He also explained that this year 121 social programs will be executed by the federal government, of which the Ministry of Public Education exercises the largest number of programs subject to operating rules, with 31.

He explained that, although the number of social programs subject to operating rules has been reduced, which went from 64 in 2018 to 45 in 2022, the amount of the budget has grown.

He said that the year with the lowest spending on programs subject to operating rules was 2019; However, as of that year, it increased from 220 billion pesos to 518 billion by 2023.

Cruz Marcelo highlighted that, as the volume of the budget grows, it entails not only greater administrative responsibility, but also that monitoring and follow-up indicators can be strengthened and increased, as well as the revision or update of operating rules, especially in the states and municipalities, where there’s still a long way to go.