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Denmark raises retirement age to 70 — the highest in Europe

Denmark is set to have the highest retirement age in Europe, after lawmakers voted to raise it to 70.

Parliamentarians passed a bill mandating the rise on Thursday, with 81 votes in favor and 21 against.

The new law will apply to people born after December 31, 1970. The current retirement age is 67 on average, but it can go up to 69 for those born on January 1, 1967, or later.

The rise is needed in order to be able to “afford proper welfare for future generations,” employment minister Ane Halsboe-Jørgensen said in a press release Thursday.

86 comments
  • Work all your life to feed the pyramid pension scheme and when you finally retire, you're too old to do anything meaningful with your life.

  • in this thread: Americans who have absolutely no idea what society looks like in Denmark. Or anywhere outside of the US actually.

    • Most Europeans have a poor understanding of what the USA looks like as well... Turns out that most people have no idea what most of the rest of the world looks like! This could even mean inside of their own country! The USA is quite large and very much varied.

    • The channel Economics Explained actually covered Denmark on this weeks video essay. The impression that I got is that they really have their shit together, even these planned retirement age changes are expected to be gradual so people can plan for it.

  • Denmark is set to have the highest retirement age in Europe, after lawmakers voted to raise it to 70.

    In addition, Denmark has the highest top personal income tax rate in Europe in 2025, at 55.9%.

    So I guess this is actually great news for everyone here that loves paying taxes, as now they get to do it even longer! Bummer all the people making a decent living off of these taxes (politicians) won't participate. Who could have seen that coming?

86 comments