Widow's pension and the right to equality: Critical points in the most recent jurisprudence

Abstract

The legal status of the widow's pension is an area within our Social Security system, being questioned for some time. The various reforms introduced in this area in recent years follow a double line: on the one hand, the expansion of potential beneficiaries (recognition of cohabiting) and, secondly, the establishment of the criterion of situation need of the beneficiary of the pension and their economic dependence on the caused subject as a determinant of entitlement. An establishment which has not been performed widely, but only for some situations (cases of cohabiting and situations of marital crisis), which leads in practice to a different legislative treatment in situations that could be considered comparable with consequent doubts about his collision with the principle of equality and non-discrimination enshrined in our Constitution.
On the other hand, we are dealing with an area in which social reality has always exceeding the legal reality, so that jurisprudence plays a key role in this work of adaptation and finalist of the regulations governing the right to a pension interpretation.