October 2023

The Role of Disability Insurance on the Labour Market Trajectories of Europeans

By Agar Brugiavini & Petru Crudu  This work documents the role played by disability insurance, typically part of a wider public pension provision package, on the labour market trajectories and retirement decisions. We will first employ a machine learning approach to estimate a Transition Probability Model able to uncover the most likely labour market histories and then evaluate the effects of policy reforms, including reforms to the eligibility for disability insurance benefits. The main contribution is the introduction of disability...

August 2023

The Impact of Aging Demographics on Public Health Challenges

The global population continues to increase, although the growth rate has been gradually declining. Specific current population trends can vary depending on the region and country. Many developing countries experience higher population growth rates compared to developed nations. Many countries are experiencing an increase in the proportion of elderly individuals due to declining birth rates and improved healthcare leading to longer life expectancy. Population dynamics play a pivotal role in shaping the direction and challenges of public health initiatives. As...

Annual report on intra-EU labour mobility 2022 published

By European Commission  Irrespective of the pandemic, the number of working age EU citizens living in another Member State remained stable, at 10.2 million in 2020. The number of persons moving, however, declined in line with the restrictions imposed because of the pandemic. With the pandemic phasing out, we expect that these figures will return to pre-Covid-levels. The labour market performance of mobile workers has, following a Covid-induced dip in 2020, again reached 74%, i.e. the same level as for nationals....

March 2023

European pensions increase ESG pressure on Asia property funds

Adoption of a real estate benchmark in Asia is increasing as leading European pension funds place reporting at the heart of their emissions reduction efforts. Pressure from investors outside Asia is increasing the quality and range of ESG data reported by Asian property funds, according to the leading global ESG benchmark for real estate. “There is increased pressure from asset owners who require their managers to participate in the annual benchmark, although this pressure mostly comes from non-Asian asset owners,”...

December 2022

Inferring Occupation Arduousness from Poor Health Beyond the Age of 50

Inferring Occupation Arduousness from Poor Health Beyond the Age of 50

By: Vincent Vandenberghe In the absence of a direct description of occupation arduousness, this paper shows how it can be inferred from poor health beyond the age of 50. Using retrospective lifetime data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) including the respondents’ professional career described with ISCO 2-digit, this paper finds a statistically significant link between many occupations and the risk of poor health beyond the age of 50. Next, we quantify the relative contribution...

November 2022

PEPP: Catalyst for Pension Innovation?

By Hans van Meerten & T.J.B. Hulshoff In the past two decades, several traditional markets have been 'disrupted' by parties with new business concepts, new technology and, above all, a big focus on consumer experience. Music, video, books, taxi, hotels, banks, meal delivery; examples abound. Is the personal pension savings market up for grabs? If it is up to the EU, yes. Through new PEPP legislation. But will this actually happen? Are providers and consumers ready for this? And what...

How much does Europe spend on pensions?

Iceland Iceland’s pension system is rated by CNBC as the best in the world and yet remarkably it only spends 2.6% of GDP on retirees, the smallest amount in Europe. Pensioners are entitled to the full ellilífeyrir payment if they’ve lived in Iceland for 40 years. Retirees can apply for a basic pension, a pension supplement and a household supplement and all amounts are based on income. The regular pension age is 67, unless you have worked at sea for...

September 2022

Do the Retired Elderly in Europe Decumulate Their Wealth? The Importance of Bequest Motives, Precautionary Saving, Public Pensions, and Homeownership

By Charles Yuji Horioka & Luigi Ventura In this paper, we use micro data on a large number of European countries from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) to examine the wealth accumulation (saving) behavior of the retired elderly in Europe. To summarize our main findings, we find that less than half of the retired elderly in Europe are decumulating their wealth and that the average wealth accumulation rate of the retired elderly in Europe is...

Reducing portfolio volatility is top priority for European pension funds

European pension funds say reducing absolute portfolio volatility is their top risk management priority, as geopolitical tensions and high inflation continue to impact global investment markets. This is according to new research from Alpha Real Capital. Nearly half (46%) of European pension fund professionals interviewed, who collectively manage €324 billion in assets under management, say increasing portfolio diversification is their top strategic asset allocation priority. Meanwhile, more than a quarter (28%) of respondents say their priority is to increase expected...

Homeownership and the Perception of Material Security in Old Age

By Claudius Garten, Michal Myck, Monika Oczkowska Homeownership has been shown to be related to various aspects of well-being, although both the causal nature of this relationship and the possible channels behind it have been difficult to identify. We focus on one of the most often quoted mechanisms which could be responsible for the positive effects of homeownership, namely its role in providing material security in old age. Using data from 15 European countries collected in wave 2 of the...