November 2024

Pension funds will have to invest more in UK assets under government plans

Pension funds will be ordered to invest more money into UK assets if changes announced last week by The Chancellor don’t see an increase in money flowing into Britain. Emma Reynolds, UK pensions minister, told the FT that while last week’s changes had avoided forcing pension funds to invest in British assets, such “mandation” would be considered if they don’t do enough. “We’re not talking about it for now, but let’s see where we get to,” Reynolds said, in an interview with...

Rethinking Pension Reform

By Giulia Giupponi & Arthur Seibold Population ageing is exerting unprecedented fiscal pressure on social security systems around the world. In response, many governments are implementing or planning pension reforms, often aimed at encouraging later retirement. A long-standing literature in public economics and labour economics investigates how the design of pension systems affects individual labour supply and retirement choices. In recent years, this literature has seen a revival, with a wave of new studies from Europe and the US combining high-quality...

How Mexico’s reformed pension system is improving workers’ retirement security

Earlier this year, Mexico’s senate approved the creation of a new pension fund to help provide more retirement security for low-income citizens. The reform aims to ensure pensioners receive 100 per cent of their last monthly salary up to roughly 16,777 Mexican pesos (US$975), which is the average monthly wage for workers affiliated with the Mexican Social Security Institute. “Congress approved this change to the pension system, which basically established a new welfare pension fund,” says Pedro Trejo, retirement director at...

UK. What will Rachel Reeves’s retirement scheme changes mean for pensions?

The chancellor has announced plans to merge local government retirement schemes into eight Canada-style ‘megafunds’ Rachel Reeves has announced plans to merge local government retirement schemes into eight Canada-style “megafunds” in what the Treasury claims will be part of the biggest reform of the UK pension market in decades. So what will the changes, announced as part of the chancellor’s inaugural Mansion House speech on Thursday, actually mean for UK pensions and what can they achieve? What is Reeves planning? The chancellor plans...

UK. Pensions to be key focus of Chancellor’s first Mansion House speech

Pensions are expected to be a key focus of Rachel Reeves’s first Mansion House Speech, due to be delivered this Thursday. Many in the industry are expecting the new Chancellor to set out bold pension reforms, setting out how DC and DB funds will be used to boost investment into UK infrastructure and private business over the next five years. This Mansion House speech is a key economic speech given by the Chancellor to senior City and banking representatives, outlining broad policy...

October 2024

Uruguay Elections: majority rejects pension reform and two candidates move on to the second round.

Early exit polls suggested opposition centre-left candidate Orsi had secured 44% of the vote, followed by Delgado's 27% for the ruling coalition and 16% for young conservative social media expert Andres Ojeda. Early exit polls in Uruguay's election suggest centre-left opposition candidate Yamandu Orsi is ahead of conservative rival Alvaro Delgado and a run-off vote is likely to be needed for a direct duel. Orsi had obtained 44% of the votes, according to an exit poll by Cifra, followed by Delgado's...

Will the Pensions Review herald long overdue integrated policy making?

The new government has laudable ambitions, but will it do more than simply “firefighting”? Pensions are a priority, judging by its speed in launching ‘a landmark’ review to boost investment, increase pension pots and tackle waste. Led by the first ever joint Treasury and DWP pensions minister Emma Reynolds, it is initially investigating scale, consolidation, the role of the single employer trust, master trusts and GPPs with their different governance structures of trustees and IGCs. The call for evidence for this, the first...

Reform for Turkish pension system urged amid inflation, early retirement, population aging

Amidst the high cost of living, a culture of early retirement, and a demographic outlook featuring population aging and a low birth rate, Türkiye's pension system is under great pressure and requires urgent reforms, experts have said. According to the state-managed Social Security Institution (SGK), some 16.4 million people receive retirement and old-age pensions in Türkiye, a country with a population of over 85 million. However, as data from Türkiye's Retirees Association showed, about one-fourth of all those retirees continue to...

Parametric Pension Reform Options in Korea

By Daniel Baksa, Boele Bonthuis, Si Guo & Zsuzsa Munkacsi Population aging in Korea will pose substantial challenges to the financial sustainability of its public pension system. Under current policies and plausible assumptions, public pension spending can increase by as much as 4 percent of GDP during 2020-70, while contribution revenue will largely stay constant. This expected rise in public pension spending mainly reflects the increase in the old-age dependency ratio (and therefore the number of pension recipients), the deceleration...

Big pension changes for divorce in South Africa

The new Pension Funds Amendment Act (PFAA) was recently signed into law, which will seriously impact divorce proceedings in South Africa. New retirement fund rules have changed how pensions are divided between divorced South Africans. “Before the PFAA it has been a well-established principle in our law that a divorce order is only enforceable against a pension fund as long as the member is still a member of the fund,” said Wright Rose-Innes. “Now, with the introduction of the PFAA and the...