Expanding private pension plans coverage is seen as an alternative to address the growing pension gap. Indeed, due to recent reforms, lower public pension system replacement rates are expected for future generations of retirees. However, in most countries, private provision remains voluntary and...

For majority of people, pensions are the most important income replacement benefit, when the ability to work is reduced (or no economic activity is expected anymore) due to old age. Moreover, equal access to social protection, regardless of the type and duration of employment, is one of the...

Old-age pension systems can be classified according to three aspects: funded versus unfunded systems (pay-as-you-go), actuarial versus non-actuarial systems, and defined benefit (DB) versus defined contribution (DC) systems.Several European countries have (or had) public old-age pension schemes...

Demographic developments are unfavourable for the financing of pension schemes in most OECD countries, implying continued growth in pension expenditure in virtually all OECD countries. This chapter examines the vulnerability of pension systems, with an emphasis on financial sustainability and...

Living considerably longer than ever before is certainly a positive fact, but at the same time, this presents a number of challenges and opens up questions how to reserve for retirement. Projections show that there will be fewer and fewer people paying into the pensions systems to support an...

Very recently, the European Institutions made progress on the Capital Markets Union (CMU). The CMU is part of the so called "Juncker-Plan" which aims to boost investment across Europe. In our contribution we focus on retirement savings and investment for growth aspects of the CMU. We find that...

With a rapidly aging population, Portugal faces some serious pension challenges including a Social Security system which is under pressure, and pension benefits gradually approaching levels that will require individuals to supplement Social Security with private savings. In addition, Portugal...

Against the background of population ageing pension debate has focussed for many years on the future increase of the so-called old-age dependency ratio, i.e. the number of older people against the number of people of working age. Incomprehensibly, this ratio is often misinterpreted as the ratio...