Romania's Government will begin the pension system reform, and the 9.4%-of-GDP limit for the total pension system's envelope, inked in the agreement with the European Commission for the national Resilience Plan PNRR, will not be sufficient, prime minister Nicolae Ciuca announced, Digi24 reported.

Last week, the minister of labor stated that the Social Democratic Party (PSD) intends to renegotiate the PNRR because the 9.4% of GDP ceiling is low and the elderly are "condemned to poverty."

Romania has assumed through PNRR that the level of gross public expenditures with pensions will not exceed 9.4% of GDP in the period 2022-2070. The target was assumed by the former Government backed by the Liberal Party (PNL), reformist party USR and ethnic Hungarians' party UDMR, led by Florin Cîţu.

In reply, Cristian Ghinea, former minister of European projects, claimed that Romania has never spent more than 8% of the GDP in this regard.

"Romania spends 8% of GDP on pensions, maximum. [...] The special pensions are around 0.9% of GDP for a few thousand people, which is enormous," Cristian Ghinea said, according to Ziarul Financiar.

andrei@romania-insider.com

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