This book examines recent changes in the landscape of retirement products and annuity markets in five countries. All the selected countries (Australia, Chile, Denmark, Sweden, and Switzerland) have mandatory or quasi-mandatory savings schemes. But they also exhibit significant differences in the...

Pension systems in Europe and Central Asia are facing unprecedented demographic change. While many of the countries in the region have undertaken reforms when the economy faces difficult times, these reforms are frequently reversed when the economy improves. The demographic challenges that the...

Since the early 1980s, the structure of arrangements to provide retirement income has gradually moved from defined benefit (DB) systems to various types of arrangements in which the provision of pensions is backed by assets, either in individual accounts or in collective schemes. This change has...

Demographic aging strains pension systems around the world, leading frequently to large pension expenditures and deficits. The increasing awareness of a looming pension crisis has led to a wave of pension reforms, particularly in the last decade. The purpose of the report is to examine the...

This paper provides an assessment of the funded pension system and the quality of the regulatory framework for both accumulation and payout phase. It suggests that the lack of portfolio diversification may contribute in the future to low returns and poor pensions and provides a number of...

This paper provides an assessment of the Polish funded pension system and the quality of the regulatory framework for the accumulation phase. There are two elements that distinguish the Polish pension fund portfolios from other reforming countries': the relatively high component of domestic...

Risk-based supervision of pension funds grew out of a project that was jointly conducted by the World Bank and the International Organization of Pension Supervisors (IOPS). The project was initiated in response to the increasing interest in the development of innovative approaches to pension...