This paper is a brief history of financial regulation. The removal and relaxation of controls on credit and interest rates in the 1980s and the growing emphasis on prudential controls is highlighted. Three criteria for evaluating financial regulation and structure are discussed: (1) stability,...

Like other financial institutions, private pension funds require a panoply of prudential and protective regulations to ensure their soundness and safeguard the interests of affiliated workers. These regulations include authorization criteria (such as as minimum capital,"fit and proper,"and...

Among the lessons financial history offers: Macroeconomic stability - low inflation and sound public finance - is important for creating the right incentives for banks and for facilitating the development of securities markets. High inflation and large fiscal deficits distort economic behavior...

To maximize the efficiency gains from the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the regulatory environment for Mexican banking, insurance, and securities markets should be further harmonized with those of the more advanced and efficient Canadian and U.S. markets. The authors argue that a...

Greece and Italy initiated efforts to improve public debt management and develop their domestic debt markets respectively in the late 1970s and mid-1980s. At that time, both countries suffered from large and rapidly growing public debt, excessive reliance on short-term bills held by commercial...

Pension reforms normally focus on the accumulation phase, plus term insurance that provides bnefits for the disabled and for dependent survivors, all of which are immediate concerns. Decumulation of the capital in workers'retirement savings accounts appears to be far in the future. But in the...

For both economic and regulatory reasons, most developing countries have underdeveloped pension funds and insurance sectors, and their social security systems face many financial and organizational problems. Wide-ranging reform would produce considerable economic and social benefits. A...

Argentina reformed its pension system in 1974, when it created an integrated, multipillar public-private pension system. Its old system had suffered from a vicious circle of unrealistic promises, high payroll taxes, widespread evasion, and growing deficits. But the reform program, enacted...

Tunisia's pension system provides old age, survivorship, and disability benefits to retired and disabled workers and their dependents. It is a partially funded system based on solidarity between generations. It is designed to provide insurance against loss of income in old age, especially for...

The main economic functions of the insurance sector are to cover financial risk and to mobilize long-term savings. The sector can also play an important role in developing the private sector and modernizing the securities market. But to play its economic and financial roles, the insurance sector...