September 2022

Sustainable finance policy a ‘blind spot’ for European pension funds

Some of Europe’s biggest pension funds are not actively engaged in emerging EU-level sustainable finance policy, according to climate think tank InfluenceMap. As reported by European Pensions, the research, which covered 25 of Europe’s largest pension funds and 10 national pension fund associations, found that only four of the 25 funds and five of the 10 associations showed ‘meaningful engagement’ with sustainable finance policy. InfluenceMap stated that these findings pointed to a potential ‘blind spot’ for the industry, which has shown...

Progressive pension systems can help tackle inequality caused by job instability

Job stability varies drastically between individuals, with some people staying in jobs for an extended period of time, and others frequently losing their jobs. As Leanne Nam writes, this heterogeneity can be an important source of inequality that often goes under the radar of governments. Drawing on a new study, she illustrates how progressive pension systems can be used to address the problem. Heterogeneity in job stability is a salient feature of labour markets. Even in the flexible and dynamic...

UK. Gig economy workers and pension rights

With many employers avoiding their obligations, it’s time the government stepped in, argue Stephen Morrall and Annabelle Woosnam Last year the case Uber BV v Aslam made headlines across the media when the Supreme Court ruled that thousands of Uber drivers are ‘workers’, as defined by legislation, and not independent contractors. Accordingly, they are legally entitled to basic employment rights. However, according to a recent Financial Times article, the Pensions Regulator chief executive has conceded that, despite his calls for...

Three Ways to Fix Latin America’s Public Finances

A former finance minister of Paraguay argues that feasible reforms can yield important results. Governments in Latin America and the Caribbean are facing a perfect storm of economic and social conditions as they seek to accelerate their post-pandemic recovery. Vulnerable communities need more help in the face of rising inequality and poverty. Health, education and other services need more resources. Governments must find a way to grow equitably and sustainably amid rising inflation, weaker world demand and high debt levels. The...

Informality and the Challenge of Pension Adequacy: Outlook and Reform Options for Peru

By Christoph Freudenberg, Frederik G Toscani Past reforms have put the Peruvian pension system on a largely fiscally sustainable path, but the system faces important challenges in providing adequate pension levels for a large share of the population. Using administrative microdata at the affiliate level, we project replacement rates in the defined benefit (DB) and defined contribution (DC) pillars over the next 30 years and simulate the impact of various reform scenarios on the average level and distribution of pensions....

Philippines. Reforming the private pension system

The Philippine private pension system has serious flaws that need to be fixed. It is not portable, not funded, not adequate, not actuarially fair, not sustainable. As a consequence, it does not ensure the continued well-being or provide a comfortable living for our retirees, especially future retirees coming from the millennial workforce and the next generation. Based on a 2018 study by the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), the Philippines will be an ‘aging population’ by 2032 when 7...

UK. Why the gig economy deserves better options for protection

For many people who consider going freelance or self-employed, added flexibility is usually the main driver. But other things you normally take for granted suddenly become more complicated, including the lack of a safety net from your employer if you happen to fall ill. The LV= Wealth and Wellbeing Monitor found that 64 per cent of working UK adults were worried about losing income if they were unable to work. A central worry was how to pay the bills and...

August 2022

Nigeria. Pencom to push pension remittances, attract informal sector operators

The National Pension Commission is taking urgent steps to enforce remittances of pension deductions by employers and to widen its public awareness of the Micro Pension Plan (MPP) in other to encourage participation among operators of the informal sector, in the country The Head of Micro Pension Department, Mr. Dauda Ahmed, said in Abuja, yesterday, that MPP was a veritable tool against poverty at old age, which he observed has been the worst challenge of people employed in the informal...

Nigeria. Pension fund, contributors hit N14trn, 9m respectively – PenCom

The Director -General, PenCom, Mrs Aisha Dahir-Umar gave the figure at a workshop organised by the commission for journalists covering the pension industry on Thursday in Lagos. The theme of the workshop was, “Increasing Informal Sector Participation In The Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) :The case for Micro Pension Plan (MPP).” Dahir-Umar, represented by the Head, Corporate Communications, Mr Abdulqadir Dahiru said increasing number of pension contributors and fund was responsible for the recapitalisation of the Pension Fund Administrators (PFA’s) by PenCom. “The...

UK. How to help the self-employed boost their pension savings

Just prior to the pandemic the self-employed made up about one in seven of the workforce, and while that is likely to have dipped somewhat through the pandemic, this remains much larger than a generation ago, driven by growth in self-employment in the decade after the financial crisis. Despite the growth in the number of people who are self-employed over the years, pension savings for this group have continued to fall. A recent report from the Office for National Statistics paints...