Pensjonskasseforeningen inviterer til Pensjonskassekonferansen 2012. 18. og 19. april 2012 Rica Park Hotel Sandefjord. Last ned programmet her.

Fafo og Pensjonistforbundet inviterer til heldagsseminar torsdag 22. mars 2012 kl 09.00 - 15.00 i Fafos lokaler i Borggata 2B på Grønland i Oslo.

Programmet er delt opp i to sesjoner. Før lunsj er tema Hva skjer med tjenestepensjonene, med innlegg av Fafo-forsker Geir Veland og leder av Banklovkommisjonen, Erling Selvig. Selvig vil kommentere de nye reglene for tjenestepensjoner som nå utarbeides. Jan Otto Risebrobakken, Storebrand, Jan Aaboen, Pensjonistforbundet, Tor Arne Solbakken LO og Svein Oppegaard, NHO debatterer deretter innleggene.

Etter lunsj er tema Fremtidens valg, tilpasninger og ytelser, med innlegg av daglig leder i Fafo, Jon M. Hippe og Alexandra Plathe, partner i Steenberg og Plathe. Deres innlegg kommenteres av Axel West Pedersen ved Institutt for Samfunnsforskning, Eystein Gjelsvik, LO og Pål Skarsbak, Virke.

Individuals save for decades to ensure that they will have financial security in retirement. That security can be threatened or eliminated virtually overnight if an individual who is in or near retirement becomes the victim of a financial fraud, such as a Ponzi scheme or sham investment in high-yield securities.

A number of countries have introduced notional defined-contribution pensions as a replacement
for public pensions of the defined-benefit type. Among OECD and EU countries, for example, these comprise Italy, Latvia, Poland and Sweden. There has been a great deal of interest in other countries in this approach to pension reform.

The lack of a secure income in older age is one of the biggest problems facing people in developing countries. Few people in poverty can afford to save for older age and family support for older people is under pressure. Around the world, the majority of older people lack a secure income, and fewer than one in five people over 60 receive a pension. The best way to tackle this problem is for governments to provide non-contributory (‘social’) pensions, as more than 80 governments around the world have done including Nepal, Bolivia, South Africa and Brazil.

In light of the consequence of ageing populations in virtually all countries and increasing government debt in many countries, retirement income systems are coming under greater scrutiny than ever before. Notwithstanding the great diversity of policies towards pensions around the world, it is important that comparisons are made and lessons are learned from the range of approaches. This report presents such research and compares retirement income systems in 16 countries, representing more than half the world’s population.

This is the sixth edition of the Pensions Universe Risk Profile (The Purple Book), a joint annual publication by the Pension Protection Fund (the PPF) and the Pensions Regulator (the regulator) which focuses on the risks faced by defined benefit (DB) pension schemes, predominantly in the private sector.

This paper studies optimal unemployment benefit levels and optimal proportional income tax rates over the business cycle. Previous research suggests that policy makers should make unemployment insurance (UI) dependent on the business cycle because the UI system can be used to smooth consumption across different economic states. However, high benefits increase unemployment. An alternative way to redistribute income is to vary tax rates over the business cycle.

The current generation of workers can expect lower pension benefits in retirement than the current generation of pensioners. Private, voluntary pension savings will therefore play a greater role in providing for old age. This paper calculates the size of the “pension gap”: the difference between the benefits from mandatory retirement-income provision and a target pension level. It then computes the amount that people would need to save to achieve the target.

The Dutch occupational pension system has been successful in securing high asset accumulation to fund generous pension promises. However, for the second time in this decade the pension system has been affected by a financial crisis and many pension funds’ assets fell below levels needed to meet regulatory requirements. Insufficient funding raises solvency issues, which could eventually lead to large fiscal costs in case of bail-outs.

The world of defined contribution (DC) pensions is changing. The introduction of auto -enrolment will result in the number of people saving in DC schemes rising dramatically. As a result of the Government’s workplace pension reforms it is expected that 5 to 8 million people will be newly saving or saving more in all forms of workplace pension scheme. DC provision will be at the forefront of efforts to give people the dignity and security in retirement they expect. To maximise the benefits of auto- enrolment, it is important that members have confidence that they are saving into durable products that can deliver good outcomes.

Using a novel dataset from the 2006 Portuguese Labor Force Survey this paper examines the impact of a voluntary reduction in hours of work, before retirement, on the moment of exit from the labor force. If, as often suggested, flexibility in hours of work is a useful measure to postpone retirement, then a reduction in working hours should be associated with retirement at later ages. Results prove otherwise suggesting that reducing hours of work before retirement is associated with early exits from the labor force. A reduction in hours of work seems to signal the worker's wish to retire sooner rather than to announce the desire of remaining in the labor market. This result may enclose the need for some alternative policy strategies regarding working hours.