According to the latest ZUS forecast (FUS23 model for 2026–2030) shows that the population of Poland will decrease from 37.35 million in 2025 to 36.51 million in 2030. In just five years, approximately 320,000 will be lost. people of working ageand the number of people of post-working age will increase by approximately 370,000.
The long-term forecast paints an even stronger picture pension fund (FUS20 model). Poland's population will decrease from 37.9 million in 2022 to 32.5 million in 2060 and 28.2 million in 2080 – that is, by over 9.7 million people. The number of working people will decrease by approximately seven million by 2060, and in 2080 it will be 41.4% lower. relative to 2022.
At the same time, the group of retirees is growing. In 2022, there were 390 retirees per thousand people of working age, and in 2061 there will be 806. This is almost a doubling of the system load. The conclusion is simple: each subsequent generation of workers will support an increasing number of beneficiaries.
Automation. Productivity is growing, but the number of jobs is not necessarily the case
Automation doesn't have to mean reducing the number of professionally active people – this is also confirmed by ZUS. However, it increases the likelihood that newly created jobs will be created slower than the number of employees lost for demographic reasons.
The report of the Polish Economic Institute “AI on the Polish labor market” shows that 3.68 million people in Poland work in professions particularly exposed to the impact of automation and artificial intelligence — mainly in finance, accounting, office services, data analysis and logistics.
In its report on the aging of societies, the OECD states clearly: even if technologies increase the productivity of companies, they will not replace real payers of contributions. In countries such as Poland, the ratio of the number of retirees to the number of workers may exceed 75%. by 2060.
From the point of view of the Social Insurance Fund, it is crucial that a robot taking over human tasks does not pay contributions. And with the decreasing number of people able to work, each lost group of payers is important.
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ZUS reassures us: the system will not collapse. But pensions will be lower
In a response sent to Business Insider, ZUS emphasizes that the pension system is stable and official forecasts do not confirm the narrative about its alleged bankruptcy. The institution ensures that Even in the period of the greatest demographic burden, the payment of benefits is not at risk because FUS has financial guarantees from the state.
However, the FUS23 forecast shows that this stability will be expensive. In the years 2026–2030, the annual deficit of the fund is expected to be as follows PLN 79.3 billion in 2026 and PLN 89 billion in 2030 (at discounted prices). At the same time, the capacity of FUS is to gradually increase to 83.3 percent in 2030. This means that the system will be balanced primarily thanks to subsidies from the budget and the mechanism of reducing the ratio of benefits to earnings.
However, in the long term, the situation is expected to improve. Currently, the pension fund deficit is over 2%. GDP, and according to the latest ZUS forecasts, the most difficult moment will occur at the end of this decade, when the deficit may approach 3%. GDP. Later, however, it will systematically decrease – depending on the demographic scenario, it may even disappear completely by 2080. This is the result of the design of the Polish pension system, which automatically adjusts the amount of benefits to demographic changes.
ZUS points out that improving the efficiency of the fund “comes at the cost of lowering the replacement rate“, i.e. the ratio of the pension to the last salary. Data from EU projections analyzed by the Institute for Structural Research show that by 2050 the average replacement rate in Poland may drop to approx. 27 percent and will remain there until 2070. In other words: the statistical pension will constitute only a quarter of the final salary.
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Why are retirement expenses growing slower than you might expect?
Data contained in the 2024 Aging Report – the official demographic and fiscal projection prepared every three years by the European Commission – show that the share of pension expenditure in Polish GDP will remain relatively stable in the long term. In 2022 it was 10.2%. GDP, and in 2070 it is expected to reach approximately 10.1 percent. GDP.
Similar conclusions come from OECD forecasts, which estimate that the share of public pension and disability expenses in Poland's GDP in 2060 will be approximately the same as today – 10.8%. compared to 10.6 percent
At first glance, this looks like good news: society is aging, but the share of spending in GDP is almost unchanged. In the international context, this is a relatively favorable result – in many other European countries, the burden of pension expenditure on GDP will increase by even several percentage points.
In fact, Polish stability results from three factors:
- decrease in the ratio of pensions to wages (lower replacement rate)
- the growing burden on working people who finance an increasing number of benefits
- maintaining subsidies from the state budget necessary to balance the fund.
The pension system will survive, but the benefits will be more modest
Hard data lead to one conclusion: the number of employees will decrease, automation will not fill this gap because it does not generate contributions, and the system as a whole will remain solvent. But individual pensions will become lower and lower, and future generations will work longer and pay higher contributions to maintain the system.
ZUS spokesman Karol Poznański emphasizes that the universal social security system was designed to be basic and stable thanks to state guarantee. However, it was intended as a pillar to be supplemented with other institutionalized forms of accumulating long-term savings — such as PPK, IKE or IKZE.
