As a result of unfavorable demographic processes, the pension systems in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) EU countries face significant challenges, which has made the implementation of reforms inevitable in the last decade. Relying on economic theory, this paper analyses the effects of the Hungarian pension reforms in comparison with those of other CEE countries, and discusses the consequences from the point of view of social policy and the sustainability of the pension schemes. We explore the reasons why the reforms in Hungary ultimately did not improve sustainability but rather contributed to dismantling the social care system. Therefore, the Hungarian case provides useful lessons for other countries, and at the same time underlines the importance of automatic adjustment mechanisms. The study pays particular attention to the theoretical analysis of pension indexation because its accurate quantitative effects are far from being sufficiently clarified in the literature, although it is vital for a thoughtful evaluation of pension reforms.

In 2000, the European Union established three principles that should guide Member State pension systems and their reforms: the financial sustainability of pension systems; adequacy of pensions; and the modernisation of systems. The latter included the achievement of greater gender equality and sought to respond to the significant gender gaps in public pension systems. This article demonstrates how the reforms carried out over the period 2000–2017 have focused on strengthening the financial sustainability of systems but may also have contributed to even greater gender inequality in old age protection. To this end, we examine the major legislative amendments concerning eligibility criteria and entitlement conditions in six countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Portugal and Spain), as representative of the social insurance scheme.

Previous studies of East Asian welfare regimes focus on similarities between social security schemes. In contrast, this paper explores cross-national variations in public–private pension mixes in six welfare states: China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. Our research echoes the pension policy analysis of international organisations but takes a step forward with emphasis on the historical and institutional characteristics of the respective pension systems. The analysis identifies three institutional patterns. First, the statist pension system (Taiwan and China) primarily relies on public pensions to provide old-age security, with private pensions playing a rather minor role. Second, in the dualist pension system (Japan and Korea) both public and private pensions work in parallel to ensure retirement income, though a clear security gap exists between workers in the formal and informal economies. Finally, the individualist pension system (Hong Kong and Singapore) is characterised by genuine fully funded individual accounts, emphasising citizens’ own responsibilities for ensuring old-age security. These three types of pension systems demonstrate distinct institutional characteristics and policy outcomes, illustrated by the juxtaposition of their institutional structures as well as by the comparison of key indicators collected from government reports and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development statistics. The paper concludes with a theoretical reflection of East Asian pension policies and a diagnosis of the distinct challenges confronted by each of the various pension patterns.

The main goal of the Norwegian pension reform of 2011 is to improve long run fiscal sustainability, not least through stronger labour supply incentives. We assess to what extent the reform is likely to live up to these intentions. To this end we combine a dynamic microsimulation model, which includes a complete description of the Norwegian population and the pension system, with CGE-modelling of the effects on all government revenues and expenditures. We find that the reform is likely to make a great fiscal impact in the long run, and higher employment plays an important role in this respect.

Radical changes have been implemented to pension schemes across the UK public sector from April 2015. This paper simulates how these changes will affect the lifetime pension and how the negotiated pension changes compare across six public sector schemes by level of education. Specifically, we simulate the occupation specific Defined Benefit (DB) pension wealth accumulated for a representative employee over the lifecycle by factoring in the recent changes to pension conditions. We find that less educated workers with low or moderate earnings in the NHS, Local Government and Civil Service schemes are the winners having secured an increase in the value of their pension of between 10–20 per cent. Graduate workers with faster wage growth in the Civil Service, Teachers and Local Government schemes lose between 3 per cent and 5 per cent. This is in sharp contrast with the Police and Fire services who have lost around 40 per cent irrespective of their education.