Germany's largest trade union federation, the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB), has put forward a proposal calling for a mandatory occupational pension scheme covering all workers in the country. DGB chairwoman Yasmin Fahimi outlined the plan in an interview with the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND), stating that the federation supports "a mandatory occupational retirement provision for everyone, with us as collective bargaining parties."
Fahimi stressed that any such scheme must be an addition to existing pension entitlements and must be at least co-financed by employers. According to her, the burden of supplementary retirement provision must not fall exclusively on employees.
A key driver behind the DGB's proposal is the scale of the coverage gap in Germany's current system. Fahimi pointed out that approximately 20 million employees in Germany have no occupational pension plan, a situation she attributed largely to the absence of collective bargaining agreements in their workplaces.
The trade unions say they stand ready to address this gap collectively for all employees through collective bargaining agreements. For companies that fall outside the scope of such agreements, Fahimi indicated it may be feasible to bring workers into existing models under certain conditions and with a low entry threshold.
While the DGB has committed to publishing concrete details by the end of the month, Fahimi left open the precise split of who would bear the costs. What is clear, she said, is that employers must be held accountable.
She acknowledged the proposal would likely face pushback, particularly around the prospect of higher contribution rates, but argued that context matters: in most European countries, mandatory pension contribution rates stand at 20 percent or more, well above German levels, and employer contributions in those countries often exceed what workers themselves pay. "This approach cannot be entirely unreasonable," she concluded.
The proposal has drawn backing from an unexpected corner. Dennis Radtke, chairman of the CDU's workers' wing (CDA), expressed support for making occupational pensions compulsory. He argued that securing a retirement income "from which one can live with dignity in old age, not just survive," will require a more integrated approach connecting statutory, occupational, and private pension pillars.
"Making occupational retirement provision mandatory for all is therefore a step in the right direction," Radtke told the Funke Mediengruppe newspapers.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) also addressed the pension question at a CDU regional party congress in Linstow, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. He affirmed that the statutory pension insurance should remain "the most important pillar" of old-age security in Germany, while also emphasising the need to strengthen private and occupational provision alongside it.
Merz ruled out pension cuts, though he left it ambiguous whether this applies to the replacement rate specifically or only to the nominal payment amounts, independent of inflation and wage trends.
Not all voices in the governing coalition are aligned. Johannes Winkel (CDU), chairman of the Junge Union, called on the federal government to reduce the already-approved pension increase. The 4.2 percent rise scheduled for 1 July should instead be capped at three percent, Winkel argued in Bild am Sonntag, with the funds saved redirected toward higher BAföG student grants and parental benefit payments.
A separate strand of the pension debate has emerged around the retirement benefits of members of the Bundestag. Research by the Bundestag's Scientific Service, requested by the Left Party (Linke), found that a single four-year parliamentary term generates pension entitlements equivalent to those accumulated by an average-wage employee over 28 years of contributions to the statutory pension system.
Sarah Vollath, the Left Party's pension policy spokesperson, described this as "absurd" in an interview with RND and renewed calls for MPs to be brought into the general statutory pension framework.
The government's pension commission is scheduled to present its recommendations on 29 June. The following day, 30 June, the senior leadership of the CDU/CSU and the SPD are set to convene to discuss their reform plans based on those findings. A word of caution came from Bremen's Mayor Andreas Bovenschulte (SPD), who warned in Der Spiegel against rushing through a pension reform. Attempting to pass sweeping changes within just a few days, he said, "is not a good idea."
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