RetireJapan

I am with you, the numbers and calculations really confuse me.

Just wanted to share my numbers until now in case they help. (However, I don’t know about deferment at all.) I have been paying to PMAC for 24 years with a salary range of 6-10 million. My pension (both public and private combined) right now is estimated at a bit over 2 million. I still have 15 years to go at the higher end of that salary range until I’m 65, so I’m hoping I’ll make it close to 3 million, although I am not counting on that based on some other people’s numbers.

I just calculated my future total nenkin from the https://www.nenkin.go.jp/ site.

Login to the nenkin website (assuming you have your User ID and password and secret question that you set).
Just below your name and number on the top page 利用者情報, click the 2nd from left option, i.e.
将来の年金額を試算する
Then click かんたん計算　 or 詳細な条件で計算　
Assuming you select the 詳細な条件で計算, click number 2: 受給開始年齢の設定
Then I clicked 受給開始年齢の設定を変更する
受給を遅らせる（繰下げ） for both 1 老齢厚生年金　 and 2　厚生年金　and choose your starting age (years and months)
Then click 入力を終える　to return to the previous page.
Then go to the bottom right corner and click 計算する and you see the exact amount (in bar chart and in numbers) for each year up to when you reach 100.
PS: for what it s worth, by postponing till 70, I will scrape over 1.7m a year.

Also, if you are paying into shigakukyosai, it is not combined with the nenkin yearly report since it's a mutual aid or something like this. (the calculations are separate), it is really confusing, until you actually retire.

When looking around regarding this subject, I discovered a website called argentum.com, that contains a nice table of how to calculate your estimated pension.

Considering that the Kokumin nenkin/National Pension scheme is always contained within the Kousei Nenkin/Employee Pension scheme (I guess that also applies to university employees):

A) Calculate the monthly payment for the National Pension scheme by the numbers of expected years of contribution:

At the moment (numbers have and will cange/d) that would be 16,610 Yen x 35 years (in your case) = 581,350 Yen

B) Calculate your Employee Pension Scheme:

0.55% x 35 years (maximum would be 40 years) x average income (in your case 10 Million) = 1,930,810

Together that would be 2,512,160 Yen a year, or 209,347 Yen per month at age 65.

This is above the average, RetireWiki.jp says that there is a cap at a 12,300,000 Yen yearly income (including bonus) which amonts to a pension of around 240,000 Yen per month, (assuming 40 years of contributions) if I calculated correctly. So there seems to be no pension higher than that (for those two types of pensions).

This is about in line with what a friend told me about two years ago, although I remember 270,000 Yen being mentioned as the max., which only a very small number of people can expect anyway, but you get the idea, as mentioned frequently before, the Japanese pension system alone is not enough for the average earner to rely on it as your only means of income in retirement.

Also, while the pension at age 65 is considered to be 100%, you can delay it until age 75, by which time it would be 184%. For each month delayed, you will receive 0.7% more. Of course this is a gamble, also you may want to look at how it would affect your tax payments, but these are the details you can worry about, when the time comes.

@captainspoke wrote:

An aside, but if you happen to be US, and have any social security earnings (high school or college jobs etc), the totalization agreement works. I only had ~20 credits/quarters, and what you usually read is that 40 are needed to collect SS. Totalization brings you up to minimums. I get about ¥50k/month (which is more than I get from kokumin nenkin), and it is direct deposited monthly, already in yen, into a local bank acct (and they pay any wire fees).

Very interested in your experience with US Social Security because I also qualify. With apologies for hijacking the thread, may I ask:

1. Did you see the SS benefit reduced by WEP?
2. How do you handle the US SS payments on Japanese taxes?

TokyoWart wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 2:59 am...
1. Did you see the SS benefit reduced by WEP?
2. How do you handle the US SS payments on Japanese taxes?

1. It likely was, but I haven't explored the calculations. The process was initiated and handled mostly thru the local pension office here, and due to this, what I get for pension here was certainly right there on the paperwork and visible to SS, and after all, I was using totalization to qualify (meaning I had qualified for a pension here). This then filtered thru to eventual contact from SS, and the liaison person simply told me what I'd be getting (and my POV on this is that beggars can't be choosers).

2. Since it comes as yen, I submit a simple sheet listing the 12 payments, total at the bottom, that goes into the return as another bit of pension 'income'. Besides naming the payments in english, the best japanese I settled on is アメリカ合衆国社会保障制度. This type of national/governmental pension is eligible for inclusion in the same tax category as national pension here. (Not sure if there are any upper thresholds at which taxation changes, etc.)

There's also a spousal benefit, a percentage of my benefit, and apparently spouse's income/pension (or not) has no effect on that percentage or calculation. (And anything about spouse was never used to arrive at my benefit.)

And there will be a survivor's benefit for my wife, which hopefully is a ways down the road...!

I started the process at the local pension office one August, and got the first payment in November. A surprise was that they (nicely!) backdated it to February somehow, so the first payment was for 10 months, and then December and later started coming as normal.

The payments are processed/sent via Citi NYC, f/x rate is excellent, and as stated, any/all wire fees are handled by them--nothing for that on my end. The embassy liaison even knew the code(s) for my local bank. Local bank was surprised when this first arrived, but some assurances and explanation on the phone were the only thing necessary, now it's simple clockwork. (After all, tho Citi handles it, the originator is given as the federal reserve, so rather unlikely to be shenanigans or money laundering.)

captainspoke wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 4:14 am

TokyoWart wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 2:59 am...
1. Did you see the SS benefit reduced by WEP?
2. How do you handle the US SS payments on Japanese taxes?

1. It likely was, but I haven't explored the calculations. The process was initiated and handled mostly thru the local pension office here, and due to this, what I get for pension here was certainly right there on the paperwork and visible to SS, and after all, I was using totalization to qualify (meaning I had qualified for a pension here). This then filtered thru to eventual contact from SS, and the liaison person simply told me what I'd be getting (and my POV on this is that beggars can't be choosers).

2. Since it comes as yen, I submit a simple sheet listing the 12 payments, total at the bottom, that goes into the return as another bit of pension 'income'. Besides naming the payments in english, the best japanese I settled on is アメリカ合衆国社会保障制度. This type of national/governmental pension is eligible for inclusion in the same tax category as national pension here. (Not sure if there are any upper thresholds at which taxation changes, etc.)

...

Thanks for taking the time to give this very helpful response.

Isodora wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2024 2:35 am When looking around regarding this subject, I discovered a website called argentum.com, that contains a nice table of how to calculate your estimated pension.

Considering that the Kokumin nenkin/National Pension scheme is always contained within the Kousei Nenkin/Employee Pension scheme (I guess that also applies to university employees):

A) Calculate the monthly payment for the National Pension scheme by the numbers of expected years of contribution:

At the moment (numbers have and will cange/d) that would be 16,610 Yen x 35 years (in your case) = 581,350 Yen

B) Calculate your Employee Pension Scheme:

0.55% x 35 years (maximum would be 40 years) x average income (in your case 10 Million) = 1,930,810

You have misunderstood these numbers.
16,610 is the payment for kokumin nenkin.
So you would contribute 16,610 per month x 12 x number of years (30, 35, 40) to get your total amount paid in.
You seem to be adding this to the expected payout from the kosei nenkin part to try and estimate the total expected payout.

Ben's figures from 2019 have max kokumin nenkin payout at 65,000yen per month. Comments here:
https://www.retirejapan.com/blog/the-nenkin-thing/