December 2023

Subjective survival beliefs and social networks

By Seung Jeonga, Iqbal Owadallya, Steven Habermana & Douglas Wright People's perceptions about their chances of survival are known to deviate from the objective survival probabilites derived statistically from mortality data. This is crucial because it may explain why people save too little, why their retirement plans are inadequate, and why they do not buy financial security products such as life insurance and annuities which could protect them and their family in the event of early death or in old...

Innovative Combo Product Design Embedding Variable Annuity and Long-Term Care Insurance Contracts

By Yang Shen, Michael Sherris, Yawei Wang & Jonathan Ziveyi This paper presents a novel combo insurance product design consisting of a variable annuity contract embedded with guaranteed minimum income benefits and long-term care insurance. This combo product provides enhanced benefits when the policyholder is functionally disabled. The Hamiltonian Monte Carlo simulation technique is utilised for numerically valuing the combo product whose underlying fund is proportionally invested in multiple asset classes. Product features including the elimination period and the maximum...

Scale Economies, Bargaining Power, and Investment Performance: Evidence from Pension Plans

By Tjeerd de Vries, S. Yanki Kalfa, Allan Timmermann & Russ Wermers We explore the relation between the size of a defined benefit pension plan and its choice of active vs. passive management, internal vs. external management, and public vs. private markets. We find positive scale economies in pension plan investments; large plans have stronger bargaining power over their external managers in negotiating fees as well as having access to higher (pre-fee)-performing funds, relative to small plans. Using matching estimators,...

The Shift that Redefined Retirement Security

By Shashwat Vidhu Sher Retirement plans have been a standard feature of public and private sector employers in the United States since the early 1900s. Although Defined Benefit plans were the mainstay of most pensions plans for much of the twentieth century, there was a massive shift in the 1980s, mainly in the private sector, towards Defined Contribution plans like 401(k). The paper argues that government policies for the private sector, new employer-employee relationship, job-switching, and familiarity with the financial...

The Employment Landscape of Older Migrant Workers in China’s Aging Society: The Role of City-Level and Industry Specialization

By Haobin Fan & Ting Zhang As China’s population ages, more older workers are participating in the labor market, including a significant number of older migrant workers moving to urban areas. However, surprisingly little research has been done on their destination city and employment patterns. This paper addresses this gap by investigating the impact of city-level and industry specialization on the employment prospects of older migrant workers. Using both individual- and city-level data, we find that unlike prime-age migrant workers, older migrant workers have higher...

Playing the Long Game: How Longevity Affects Financial Planning and Family Caregiving

By Surya Kolluri, Janet Weiner & Mary Naylor Since 1935, when Social Security set the age to receive full benefits at 65, average life expectancy in the United States has risen by 17 years. This increased longevity has clear implications for financial planning, both in terms of the timing of retirement and the need to plan for a longer period of retirement. But there are less obvious implications as well, in terms of the likelihood and length of time that...

Beneficios Económicos Periódicos (BEPS): promoviendo el ahorro en un entorno de informalidad

Por Juan Miguel Villa Lora & Any Andrea Benítez Duarte La Seguridad Social en Colombia ha evolucionado en un frente constitucional y legislativo dentro de un contrato social en el que ninguna prestación económica puede ser inferior al salario mínimo.3 De hecho, entre todas las constituciones de América Latina y el Caribe, la colombiana es una de las pocas que señala el monto mínimo de una pensión. En la práctica ello excluye a más de la mitad de la población en...

El sistema de pensiones contributivas y no contributivas en México. Un análisis desde la perspectiva de género y derechos al 2021

Por Angélica Paola González Lozada El sistema de pensiones, en sus esquemas contributivo y no contributivo, no considera las diferencias en la vida laboral entre hombres y mujeres marcadas principalmente por la división sexual del trabajo, la cual obliga a las mujeres a hacerse cargo del trabajo reproductivo en materia de cuidados (directos, indirectos y de gestión). La consecuencia de esto se ve reflejada en las constantes interrupciones que tiene la trayectoria laboral de las mujeres por atender dichos mandatos...

Un estudio internacional del sistema de pensiones para el régimen de pensiones mexicano

Por Alfredo Prieto Gómez & María Enriqueta Mancilla-Rendón Los gobiernos de los países del mundo buscan apoyar a los beneficiarios del régimen de pensiones que son aplicables en la etapa improductiva de la vejez; en ocasiones este propósito no se alcanza, trayendo consigo reflexiones sobre si un sistema de pensiones sea el apropiado. Por ello, el objetivo de nuestro estudio fue analizar el sistema de pensiones de algunos países de la Unión Europea (UE), Estados Unidos, Canadá y Chile, para...

Social Protection for Older Persons Social Pensions in Asia

By Sri Wening Handayani & Babken Babajanian The rising number of older persons in Asia has accentuated the importance of strengthening the systems of social protection in the region. This book examines the effectiveness and relevance of noncontributory or social pensions in supporting older persons in Asia. It discusses the political economy and financial sustainability of social pension reform, implications for gender equity and social rights, and design and implementation challenges. Case studies from Bangladesh, Nepal, Thailand, Viet Nam, and South...