In this report, we consider policies to help people appropriately manage their defined contribution (DC) pension wealth through later life. We draw on evidence in a report published alongside this one (Boileau, Cribb and Emmerson, 2025), which sets out key information on the landscape in which...

This report is one of two reports on the management of pension wealth in retirement conducted as part of the Pensions Review, led by the Institute for Fiscal Studies in partnership with the abrdn Financial Fairness Trust. In this report, we examine the decisions that older individuals face as...

The new German federal government coalition is planning a significant tax break for workers of retirement age: the active pension (Aktivrente). With the active pension, workers who have reached the statutory retirement age may earn up to 2,000 euros a month tax-free, a move that the government...

Because of demographic and fiscal challenges, supplementary pensions are becoming increasingly important to ensure adequate retirement income for EU citizens. In this context, the EU has set minimum requirements for supplementary pensions provided by institutions for occupational retirement...

This paper establishes a theoretical link between actuarial neutrality and the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition to empirically assess vertical equity in public defined-benefit schemes. We demonstrate how this approach can be generalized to non-linear functions, point systems, and notional accounts....

Using the 2021 National Financial Capability Study (NFCS), this study examines the association between gender-based participation in employer-sponsored retirement plans and financial literacy. It also decomposes the association between gender-based participation in employer-sponsored retirement...

Low- and middle-income countries are aging rapidly but stagnation of growth in participation in pension programs, due to widespread informal employment, presents a major fiscal challenge. Some claim that improving the design of pension program rules can encourage more pension contributions,...

The current system of private pension savings in the UK is based on employers choosing a workplace pension provider, to which contributions from the employee and employer are sent, and which invests the contributions on behalf of the employee. This means that when an individual leaves their...

This report examines ethnic differences in pension participation in the UK following the nationwide roll-out of automatic enrolment, the drivers of those gaps, and the consequences for wealth accumulation. It draws on an academic research paper (Cribb, O'Brien and Sturrock, 2025) published...

Because of demographic and fiscal challenges, supplementary pensions are becoming increasingly important to ensure adequate retirement income for EU citizens. In this context, the EU has set minimum requirements for supplementary pensions provided by institutions for occupational retirement...

Im österreichischen Pensionsrecht ermöglicht eine durchgängige Erwerbskarriere eine Pensionshöhe von 80% des durchschnittlichen Erwerbseinkommens. In dieser Studie wird die Auswirkung einer allgemeinen zusätzlichen betrieblichen Altersvorsorge auf die Höhe der Erstpension untersucht. Eine...

This paper provides a comparative analysis of the pension systems in Brazil and Canada, focusing on their historical evolution, structural frameworks, and the demographic and fiscal challenges they face. By examining the development of these systems, the study highlights the unsustainable...

Using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement (SHARE), this paper examines occupational pension income and coverage gaps between men and women. The focus is on a group of countries with comparable occupational pension regulations: Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands and Switzerland....

We investigate how firms adjust corporate pension plans in response to economic policy uncertainty (EPU). Using a sample of US-listed firms, we find that firms increase pension underfunding levels when facing higher EPU. The result is robust to controlling for pension portfolio returns, discount...

The study analyzes and assesses the economic and linguistic complexity of individual retirement products in Poland. For this purpose, an original multidimensional approach was used and various research methods were applied. We analyzed 75 out of 86 individual pension products (IKEs and IKZEs)...

Defined benefit (DB) pension plans are a primary type of pension schemes with the sponsor assuming most of the risks. Longevity-indexed bonds have been used to hedge or transfer risks in pension plans. Our objective is to study an aggregated DB pension plan's optimal risk management problem...

We examine who bears the costs of mandated workplace pension programs, exploiting the quasi-experimental rollout of automatic enrollment in the UK. Total compensation (take-home pay plus employer contributions) increases, driven by employer contributions, while the amount of take-home pay...

Pension credits for care periods are a key policy lever to protect the pension rights of carers and support gender equality in pensions. They are designed to compensate for a break in 'working time' so that there are no significant gaps in pension entitlements. Pension care credit policies...