Catalonia surpasses 10% of employees with retirement savings through their company

Only 9.2% of Spanish workers have a retirement savings product contracted through their company. In Catalonia, the figure rises to 10.8%, above the national average.

According to 65ymas.com, the IV Barometer of Corporate Social Security and Retirement in Spain, prepared by Nationale-Nederlanden in collaboration with the consulting firm 40dB, places Catalonia among the two regions that best protect their employees in this area. With 10.8% of workers having retirement savings through their company, the region is above the national average of 9.2%.

The study highlights a contradiction. 75.5% of the surveyed employees believe that the public pension will not allow them to maintain their standard of living, and 73.8% assert that their income would suffer significantly or quite a lot if they depended solely on it. Despite this concern, the uptake of savings schemes from the workplace remains low.

By region, the Community of Madrid leads the ranking with 15.3%. Following Catalonia are Andalusia, with 9.8%, and the Valencian Community, with 4.3%. In Catalonia, 79% of workers believe that the public pension will not be enough to maintain their standard of living, a percentage similar to that of Madrid, where it stands at 80.9%.

Among those who do have such a product, the most common are pension plans, at 75%. They are followed by retirement savings insurance, at 54.4%, and corporate social security plans, at 14.1%. In fact, Catalonia is the region where employment pension plans have the most weight among those who contract them, with 81%.

Age also marks differences. 78.6% of those under 45 years consider it necessary to have additional savings, but it is those over 55 years who contract the most: 51.3% have some form of savings solution, whether company or individual. The report does not detail what happens with contracting beyond these percentages.

The barometer also points to room for improvement in the role of companies. Nearly half of employees do not perceive a clear commitment from their company to retirement, and eight out of ten do not expect the situation to change in the short term. Moreover, three out of four workers believe that companies should be required to offer complementary savings products.

“Companies have an increasingly relevant opportunity to contribute to the financial well-being of their employees and strengthen their value proposition as employers,” says Mikel Maylin, business director of Nationale-Nederlanden Employee Benefits.

The study is based on 1,000 surveys of employees with indefinite contracts in companies across Spain and 400 surveys of companies. Those with these products are, according to the report, more satisfied with their work situation and would more likely recommend their company as a workplace.