Private pension funds in Argentina's new integrated pension system have shown a vigorous response and a robust performance in a highly uncertain economic environment. But despite their success in mobilizing long-term funds and in earning high real investment returns, the funds have suffered from...

Argentina's experience with pension reform offers important lessons for Eastern Europe. A balanced reform is politically feasible, while prolonged delays in implementing pension reform can lead to the collapse of traditional, unfunded pension systems. Argentina reformed its pension system in...

The studies in this two-volume work shed new light on the range and viability of the emerging corporate governance institutions in the transitional economies of Central Europe. Regional specialists and experts on corporate governance in advanced economies examine the emerging forms of ownership...

One of the biggest criticisms leveled at defined contribution individual account (IA) components of social security systems is that they are too expensive. This paper investigates the cost-effectiveness of three options for constructing funded social security pillars: 1) IA's invested in the...

This paper provides a comparative summary of the payout phase of pension systems in five countries -- Australia, Chile, Denmark, Sweden, and Switzerland. All five countries have large pension systems with mandatory or quasi-mandatory retirement savings schemes. But they exhibit important...

This paper examines the policy issues, constraints and options facing policymakers in promoting the development of sound markets for retirement products. It discusses the various risks faced by pensioners and the risk characteristics of alternative retirement products and also reviews the risks...

Over the past decade or so, most Central and Eastern European countries have reformed their pension systems, significantly downsizing their public pillars and creating private pillars based on capitalization accounts. Early policy attention was focused on the accumulation phase but several...

Despite the limited scope resulting from the high payroll taxes for the compulsory, unfunded public pillar in Hungary's pensions system, the early voluntary private pensions fund performance has been encouraging. Investment returns have been well above the inflation rate and participation has...