April 2025

Longevity v interest rates – which poses the biggest risk for schemes?

Rising life expectancy poses a greater risk to UK corporate pension schemes than low interest rates, a report this week has suggested, but some industry experts have challenged the finding. Low interest rates have wreaked havoc on many schemes’ funding levels as liability calculations are revised up. Earlier this month the aggregate deficit of the Pension Protection Fund’s 7800 Index reached £254.2bn, up from £93.2bn a year ago. The cost of not hedging longevity in a low interest rate environment is proportionately greater...

For Most Americans, Going Broke in Retirement Is a Bigger Fear Than Death: Survey

The Allianz Center for the Future of Retirement has published its annual retirement study, finding yet again that a solid majority of Americans say they worry more about running out of money in retirement than they worry about their mortality. Specifically, 64% of survey respondents this year said they worry more about financial destitution in retirement than death. Despite the concern, 62% say they are not saving as much for retirement as they would like, while 54% say inflation contributes to their...

UK. Research reveals lack of retirement preparedness as life expectancy increases

Less than two thirds (60 per cent) of professional investors feel they are either fully or almost fully financially prepared to help their clients in living for longer in retirement, research by Fidelity International has revealed. However, the research, which included responses from institutional investors and intermediary distributors across Europe and Asia, found that 40 per cent of respondents felt there was a lack of readiness to support clients in this area. Fidelity International global head of client solutions, Katie Roberts...

March 2025

Parental Leave Policies, Fertility, and Labor Supply

By Daisoon Kim & Minchul Yum South Korea has been facing persistently low fertility rates and large gender gaps in labor supply. In response, the government has expanded parental leave benefits to address these challenges. To evaluate the effectiveness of these policies, we develop a quantitative, heterogeneous-household life-cycle model in which couples make joint decisions on careers, labor supply, savings, and child-related choices, including fertility, childcare, and parental leave take-up. The model is calibrated to recent Korean cohorts to replicate...

Future-Proofing the Longevity Economy: Innovations and Key Trends

By World Economic Forum The world is at a pivotal moment in its demographic transition, with more than one in four people now living in countries where the population has peaked. This shift, coupled with increasing life expectancy and declining birth rates, presents both urgent challenges and unprecedented opportunities. Building on the Longevity Economy Principles, this white paper synthesizes five key trends shaping the future of the longevity economy: building resilient public retirement systems; transitioning from savings accumulation to decumulation; enhancing the...

The Gender Pensions Gap

By Khadijah Zaidi & James Mirza-Davies The gender pensions gap refers to differences in retirement income or retirement wealth for men and women, and it can be measured in different ways. The gender pensions gap is mainly caused by the gender pay gap. There are however additional causal factors relating specifically to pensions, such as historic state pension rules, the impact of auto-enrolment rules on different types of workers, and how divorce settlements treat pensions. The Work and Pensions Committee...

February 2025

How should policy-makers think about longevity?

As people live longer, public policy and public spending should pivot towards ensuring longer, healthier and more active lives. This includes a shift towards preventative healthcare and lifelong education. Economists have been warning of ageing societies for decades. Globally, falling birth rates and rising life expectancy are leading to an increasing proportion of older people. In the UK in 1950, one in nine of the population was over 65 years old; today, it is around one in five. That share...

Living Beyond Age 100: A Possibility With Financial Impact

Living beyond age 100 might sound like the stuff of science fiction, but think about how many once-impossible ideas are now part of everyday life. Air travel, landing on the moon, mobile phones and even the ability to map our DNA were unthinkable not long ago. Now, breakthroughs in medicine and technology are nudging us closer to the possibility of living significantly longer, healthier lives. While immortality isn’t on the table just yet, the idea of living well beyond 100...

January 2025

Retirement is a risky business for most people

Firstlinks published an article by Bruce Bennett on 8 January 2025 that highlighted some of the problems with the Commonwealth Super Scheme (CSS): This article drew comparisons between account-based pensions available from industry super funds and SMSFs. I think those comparisons are misplaced. A more interesting exercise would be to compare the CSS with the age pension because both are income streams that are paid for life and indexed to inflation. In both cases, the provider is the Commonwealth Government and benefits are...

2024 BlackRock Read on Retirement

By BlackRock Retirement. It’s deeply personal. And yet, many of the challenges workers face are common and shared. The relationship someone new to the workforce has with retirement is likely very different than that of someone later in their career. Layer in factors like individual experience and a lack of access to the right tools, opportunities and guidance… and suddenly the path can get complex. But we’re rethinking retirement – because it doesn’t have to be. Get the report here.