Philippe Nanterdmod addresses a very sensitive subject.Image: Keystone
Retirees benefit the most from health insurance benefits. Valais PLR national advisor Philippe Nantermod therefore wants to know to what extent families with young children would be relieved if retirees were required to pay more.
Kari Kälin / ch media
No other subject concerns the Swiss as much as health insurance premiums. According to the latest UBS barometer, no less than 48% of the population is worried about this. Then come climate change, old age provision and asylum.
There are currently three levels of bonuses. It is for children that they are the lowest: their average annual premium amounted to 1,243 francs in 2023. Young adults aged 19 to 25 paid their share of 3,409 francs. From the age of 26, the average annual premium was 4,856 francs in 2023, this rate applying until the end of life. Young families are particularly affected by constantly rising health care costs. They are the ones who most often receive subsidies.
Generational imbalance
However, young people generate significantly lower costs than seniors. In 2023, insurers paid their customers benefits worth nearly 34.6 billion francs. Nearly half of this amount concerned people aged 65 and overwhile they only contribute a quarter to the total volume of premiums.
With the aging of the population, the imbalance between the generation of contributors and that of beneficiaries is increasing, explains Philippe Nantermod. The Valais PLR national advisor therefore asked the Federal Council to what extent families with young children would be relieved if retirees were required to pay more. He filed an inquiry to this effect during the winter session.
Nantermod, 40 years old and father of two young children, expects the Federal Social Insurance Office to present calculation models in its response to his intervention. It does not specify how much the premium supplement for seniors will be. For example, he could imagine an average monthly premium of 600 francs. This would represent almost 200 francs more than today.
“Poor = old”
The idea of a bonus for seniors had already been considered in the past. The former Aargau national councilor of the Center Ruth Humbel had therefore proposed to the Federal Council to examine the possibility of a supplement of 50 francs per month. She explained that young insured persons subsidized, through their health insurance premiums, older insured personsmost of whom are already well off.
Seventeen members of the PDC group had, at the time, signed the interpellation. “The equivalence ‘poor = old’ is no longer valid,” Humbel then declared to the Neue Luzerner Zeitung. This would be seen in the subsidy figures, on which the younger generation especially depends. Humbel then cited a study which showed that people aged 55 to 75 were best off financially.
This hypothesis was recently confirmed by a recent study commissioned by the Federal Social Insurance Office. In Switzerland, retirees are the best endowed with assets. Half of retired couples have 563,000 francs, compared to 397,800 francs for couples of working age. The reasons are legacies as well as the removal of the second and third pillars.
«Prime punitive»
Humbel’s proposal sparked strong reactions at the time. L’Argovienne had received around a hundred e-mails of complaint and numerous telephone calls demanding his resignation. The Lucerne PDC even organized a confrontation between the former national councilor and senior Christian Democrats during a demonstration.
In an interview, Peter Dietschi (PLR/SO), then director of Pro Senectute Lucerne, called Humbel’s idea a “punitive bonus”. He noted that Swiss grandparents looked after their grandchildren for many hours every year, worth several billion francs.
Humbel, however, received the support of Markus Dürr (PDC/LU), then director of health in Lucerne and party colleague. According to him, the risk of poverty is clearly among young people and a bonus for seniors would be appropriate. However, the Federal Council did not see the need to act.
For his part, Philippe Nantermod knows that he is tackling a sensitive subject. But he argues that if, as a politician, you don’t accept critical reactions, you lose. The PLR national advisor affirms that he does not question solidarity between generations. But:
“It is a fact that in terms of health insurance, but also old age provision, there is a transfer from young people to old people”
Philippe Nantermod
According to him, a large part of the economic growth of the last twenty years has thus been “eaten”.
Translated and adapted from German by Léa Krejci
