Germany: Would you take a 100% employer pension match despite high fees and a possible move abroad?
I am 33, currently living and working in Germany and earning around €90,000 gross per year. My employer is offering a German occupational pension, known as a bAV, and I am trying to decide whether the employer match is generous enough to compensate for the fees and lack of flexibility.
I would sacrifice €161 from my monthly gross salary and my employer would contribute another €161. This means €322 goes into the pension while my actual net salary falls by approximately €99.61 per month.
The contract has an 80% contribution guarantee and invests through a mixture of the insurer’s general account, a guarantee fund and an MSCI World ETF. The effective reduction in yield shown in the documents is 2.05 percentage points. There are also €3,284 in acquisition and distribution costs during the first five years, €202 in annual administration costs and an additional annual charge of 0.1% of the contract value. The pension normally starts when I am 67 and cannot be accessed before 62.
I compared this with investing the same €99.61 per month in a low-cost All-World ETF. Using two percent inflation, a seven percent gross ETF return and current German investment taxation, the ETF would be worth approximately €13,200 in today’s money after ten years, €30,200 after twenty years and €54,000 after thirty years.
Using the insurer’s own investment projection, the pension would have inflation-adjusted values of around €33,500, €72,600 and €117,100 over the same periods before retirement taxes and health insurance charges. After applying an assumed effective income-tax rate of 25% and an estimate based on the current German public health and long-term-care insurance system, I get net-equivalent values of roughly €22,300, €43,400 and €67,500.
The pension therefore wins in my model, but it is not an entirely fair comparison because I would not actually be able to access it after ten or twenty years. The ETF would remain fully liquid. The salary sacrifice also slightly reduces my future German state pension.
My biggest concern is that I may leave both the employer and Germany long before retirement. As far as I understand, leaving Germany would not unlock the pension. I could probably leave it paid-up, continue it privately or attempt to transfer it to another German employer, but its eventual taxation would depend on where I live and the applicable tax treaty.
How would you value the employer match if there is a realistic chance of moving to another country within five or ten years? I am currently leaning towards contributing exactly enough to receive the full match and directing all additional savings into an All-World ETF.
I would also be interested in hearing from anyone who left Germany with a bAV. In practice, was keeping and eventually receiving it straightforward, or did the tax and administrative complications reduce its value?