June 2026
24Jun

European pension systems face demographic and labor market pressures – PensionsEurope

European pension systems, while built on different national models, are facing broadly similar structural challenges, according to PensionsEurope, Trend's correspondent reports from the event. Speaking at the 11th Azerbaijan International Insurance Forum in Baku, Matti Leppäla, Secretary General and CEO of PensionsEurope, said that although each European country has its own pension framework, many of the underlying problems are shared. He noted that countries such as France, Italy, and Spain rely primarily on state-financed pay-as-you-go pension systems, while several other European states...

June 24, 2026
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16Jun

What one country’s experiment says about attempts to boost birth rates

Sitting on a park bench in the eastern Hungarian city of Debrecen, Barbara Elek is nervously refreshing her emails. She and her husband Levi are waiting to find out if Barbara is pregnant, after their third round of IVF 10 days ago. "If it doesn't succeed, then obviously I'll be devastated, and then the last resort will be trying to make sure that, at least financially, we don't lose everything," she tells BBC Global Women. Like many other young Hungarian couples...

June 16, 2026
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12Jun

What Do Prospective Teachers Retirees’ Fear about Retirement?

By Jaquiline Amani This qualitative study explored prospective teacher retirees’ perceived fears about retirement and identified key drivers of retirement anxiety. Data were collected through focus group discussions with 22 teachers from two regions of Tanzania. The participants were purposively selected from public schools and had ten years or less remaining before reaching voluntary or mandatory retirement age. Thematic analysis revealed that teachers’ fear of retirement was shaped by multiple, interconnected factors, including anticipated social exclusion, income reduction and financial...

June 12, 2026
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12Jun

LGBTQ+ Labor Market Outcomes

By Travis Campbell & Yana Van Der Meulen Rodgers The emerging field of LGBTQ+ economics has convincingly demonstrated that LGBTQ+ individuals face distinct labor market disparities. This chapter provides an overview of their unfavorable labor market outcomes and then focuses on several specific issues for transgender workers. Previous studies show that gender-affirming care can improve mental health, whereas conversion therapy, which denies an individual's gender identity, damages mental health. An unexplored question is whether these mental health effects extend to...

June 12, 2026
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08Jun

Why Hasn’t the Labor Shortage Pushed Up Real Wages?

For a dozen years, the Bank of Japan, the government, and stockbrokers have all been promising that a labor shortage in Japan will soon push up wages. And that faith is behind the BOJ’s decision that it’s time to normalize interest rates. Here’s the argument. Due to the declining working-age population, companies in 2014 offered 1.2 jobs for every job seeker. By 2019, the ratio had climbed to 1.6 and is now 1.2. So, it is argued: when demand...

June 8, 2026
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May 2026
29May

Old and new welfare states retaining older workers in the face of crisis: the case of COVID-19 in Europe

By Kun Lee The Coronavirus pandemic was a unique crisis in Europe as an unprecedented health and labour market shock barely disrupted long-term trends towards active ageing. We study the role of social policy responses and pre-existing welfare state institutions in moderating older workers’ early exit following the crisis. Using a cross-nationally harmonized panel survey in Europe, we examine whether variations in national labour market policies and pension institutions explain older workers’ exit outcomes following COVID-19, net of the economic...

May 29, 2026
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29May

Global Pensions at a Glance

The availability of pension fund income to retirees in a country is one indicator of how much people can spend in retirement. Countries dominated by defined contribution plan retirement systems continue to work on how best to convert retirement savings into retirement income and research shows that when people are not confident about income in retirement, spending slows. In a global consumption-based economy, the amount consumers can spend will drive economic activity and demographics will determine how many consumers are...

May 29, 2026
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28May

Kenya’s 18.1 Million Informal Workers Hold The Future Of Pensions

Kenya created over 822,000 new jobs in 2025, according to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics Economic Survey 2026 released recently.  At first glance, this signals a resilient economy. But the composition of those jobs tells a more important story that reshape how we think about savings, pensions, and financial security. Over 87% of these jobs were created in the informal sector. Today, 83.8% of Kenya’s workforce, about 18.1 million people, earn their living outside formal employment. This is not...

May 28, 2026
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26May

China now home to more people over 65 than children, official survey finds

For the first time in records dating back to 1949, China is now home to more people aged 65 and above than children, the latest official data showed, underscoring the country’s deepening demographic pressure. By November last year, 15.87 per cent of China’s roughly 1.4 billion-strong population was aged at least 65, compared with 15.25 per cent aged between 0 to 14, according to the results of a nationwide sample survey released late last week. That meant China’s traditional family-based model...

May 26, 2026
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22May

Informality, Gender and Aging. Cumulative Inequalities and Intergenerational Effects

By Haut Comissariat Au Plan Since 2021, His Majesty King Mohammed VI’s High Guidance on social development has driven a structural project to extend social protection, focusing on the expansion of mandatory health coverage, the gradual integration of self-employed workers into pension schemes, and the introduction of universal family allowances. The New Development Model sets out this vision by establishing objectives in terms of decent employment, the economic inclusion of women, and intergenerational sustainability. The analysis presented in this report examines, in...

May 22, 2026
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