The number of pension recipients decreased by 4,124 people over the past year, to 455,667 in January 2018 from 459,781 a year ago.
In December 2017, 48.2 percent of recipients were paid EUR 200 to EUR 300 in monthly old-age pension, 24.4 percent received EUR 300 to EUR 400 and 7.4 percent of seniors were paid EUR 400 to EUR 500 in old-age pensions.
At the same time, 5.1 percent of elderly people received less than EUR 100 in pension, and 6.6 percent received between EUR 100 and EUR 200 a month.
There were also 1,836 recipients of larger pensions. Their monthly pensions exceeded EUR 1,500. The share of pensions receiving more than EUR 500 a month was 8.3 percent.
As reported, Latvia has to significantly increase the minimum pension and improve pension indexation mechanisms in order to reduce poverty among elderly residents as well as pension inequality, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) assessment of Latvia's pension system.
The OECD points out that Latvia can increase the basic pension level from 8 percent of the average wage in the country to the OECD average of approximately 20 percent.
