The Lithuanian president's office wants the parliament to pass a law providing for faster raises of pensions.
Retirement pensions in the country have been indexed to the growth of wages since 2018 and increased 7.5 percent this year. However, in order to alleviate poverty among the elderly, pensions have to rise faster than wages, President Gitanas Nausėda has said.
According to the president's adviser Simonas Krėpšta, pension rises should outpace the growth of work income for at least five years.
Raising pensions is part of a package of proposals put forward by President Nausėda that includes 100-million-euro-worth of additional welfare spending and tax reforms to pay for it.
Krėpšta says that the parliament should include some of those proposals into the government spending bill for next year. However, the president's office will draft a separate proposal for faster pension raises, according to him.
The average pension in Lithuania is currently 345 euros. Over a third of people over the age of 65 live in relative poverty, according to Statistics Lithuania.
