A new actuarial study will examine the surge in retirements, the average age at which Greeks leave the workforce and the finances of the pension funds consolidated under e-EFKA, the country’s main social-security agency. The findings could ultimately influence decisions on whether Greeks will have to work longer in the decades ahead.
Between 2020 and 2025, e-EFKA awarded 1,186,035 new pensions. About 65% were old-age pensions, 17% survivors’ benefits and 18% disability pensions. The pace accelerated sharply at the start of the decade. Greece awarded 175,705 new pensions in 2020 and a five-year high of 212,151 in 2021. Another 190,368 were awarded in 2022 and 197,228 in 2023, while 199,450 pensions were granted in 2025.
The pressure hasn’t subsided. More than 100,000 retirement applications were submitted in the first half of this year, suggesting the full-year figure could exceed 200,000 and potentially challenge the 2021 peak.
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The retirement surge matters because Greece faces the same demographic squeeze affecting much of Europe, only more acutely: an aging population, low birthrates and a shrinking pool of working-age people available to finance benefits for retirees.
The new assessment will examine whether those trends threaten the pension system’s long-term fiscal sustainability. A key consideration is the trajectory of pension expenditure and whether spending pressures could eventually require measures to contain costs. Raising the retirement age would be among the most consequential options.
The National Actuarial Authority has requested detailed data from the Labor Ministry and e-EFKA, including new pensions awarded between 2020 and 2025, average retirement ages, the number of active contributors and pensions still pending at the end of 2025. It is also examining financial results for 2023 through 2025 and projections for 2026 across the various components of the pension system.
The review forms part of Greece’s obligation to conduct a pension-sustainability assessment every two years and submit it to the European Commission’s Ageing Working Group, which monitors the long-term fiscal effects of demographic change across the European Union.
The previous actuarial study, completed in 2024, concluded that Greece’s pension system remained fiscally sustainable despite worsening demographics. It projected that pension expenditure would gradually decline from about 14.5% of gross domestic product to around 12% over the coming decades.
But that outlook came with an important condition: retirement ages would eventually have to adjust as Greeks live longer. Greek law links retirement thresholds to changes in life expectancy after age 65. An increase had initially been considered for the 2027-2030 period, but the government postponed the adjustment because postpandemic data didn’t show a sufficiently strong increase in life expectancy. The issue is now expected to be revisited around 2030.
The potential changes are substantial. Under scenarios in the previous actuarial study, the retirement age for someone with 40 years of contributions, currently 62, could rise to 63½ in 2030, 64½ in 2040 and 65½ in 2050. It could reach 67½ by 2070 if the longevity adjustment mechanism is fully applied.
For workers qualifying with 15 years of contributions, the current retirement age of 67 could rise to 68 years and five months in 2030, 69 years and five months in 2040 and 70½ in 2050, eventually reaching 72½ by 2070.
Those figures are projections rather than predetermined retirement ages. Whether they materialize will depend largely on the evolution of life expectancy and the application of Greece’s existing pension rules.
The new study will now determine whether the extraordinary departure of more than 1.18 million workers into retirement, combined with the latest demographic and longevity data, changes that outlook.
