Early pensions, all options on the table for 2025: Quota 41, Ape sociale, Opzione donna and more

In view of the definition of the 2025 manoeuvre, the pension construction site is in full swing. Not least because some of the instruments that can be used this year for early exit expire at the end of 2024: these are Quota 103, Ape sociale and Opzione donna. The government is called upon to decide whether to extend them, perhaps with some adjustments, or to replace them with new measures as part of a mini-reform of flexibility in exit. Which, however, seems difficult to reconcile with the reduced resources available to the executive for the next budget law. Without considering that different schools of thought have emerged in the majority on the solutions to adopt. Here are the various options currently on the table for early retirement while waiting for the government's final choice.

It is the League's workhorse: the possibility of leaving with 41 years of contributions, regardless of age, which would still be bound to the contributory method. But this solution, which would still cost more than 500 million, has almost no chance of being included in the next manoeuvre because it would contribute to increasing pension expenditure, which is already running at a fast pace.

This is a variant of 'contributory' Quota 41, intended for a limited audience and, therefore, with a lower impact on public accounts. The possibility of exit with 41 years of contributions, regardless of age, always anchored to 'contribution-based', would only be granted to those who have at least 12 months of contributions before reaching the age of 19.

It had popped up in the preparatory phase of the 2024 manoeuvre to replace Quota 103 'without constraints', with the aim of allowing early retirement at the earliest at 63 years of age and 41 years of contributions. Due in part to resistance from the League, this option was eventually shelved to make way for a contributory version of Quota 103. But it is not entirely excluded that it could reappear in the event that the blanket of resources available for the 2025 manoeuvre should turn out to be very short.

For this year only, it is possible to take early retirement with 62 years and 41 years of contributions (Quota 103) but with the contributory recalculation of the cheque. This is an exit channel that has not had much 'appeal' since so far there have been about 7,000 retirements. It is precisely the limited scope and low costs that could induce the government to resort to a one-year dry extension in the event that no agreement is reached on an alternative measure.