Harmonization of Pension Schemes in Europe? A Controversial Issue in the Light of Economics

Schmähl, Winfried

doi:10.1007/978-1-349-22668-9_12

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…With regard to statutory provision, most of the literature suggests that mobile workers can be quite confident of adequate protection. Many studies assume that the legislation described previously prevents losses on account of mobility (Schmähl, ; Whiteford, ; Andrietti, ; Holzmann et al ., ; Kalogeropoulou, ; Forteza, ). However, this claim has rarely been investigated empirically (see also Holzmann and Koettl, :49), and when it has, problems have been identified (Wildasin, ; Fenge and von Weizsäcker, ).…”

Section: Portability Of Pension Rights In the Eu – Legislation And Itmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The situation is even more problematic in the non‐state occupational sphere. It is well known, for example, that defined benefit schemes tend to penalise early leavers (Schmähl, ; Whiteford, ; Andrietti, ; Kalogeropoulou, ), but these problems are further complicated when mobility is cross‐national, because of the different regulatory frameworks, scheme designs and terminologies that exist between countries (Andrietti, ; Forteza, ). Defined contribution schemes are more portable than defined benefit schemes because after a vesting period, early leavers can normally withdraw the actuarially fair value of their pension funds (Andrietti, ).…”

Section: Portability Of Pension Rights In the Eu – Legislation And Itmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Previous academic work on the portability of social rights has examined the mobility of public pensions (for example Schmähl, ; Whiteford, ; Holzmann et al ., ; Kalogeropoulou, ) and how mobility affects occupational pension outcomes (for example Andrietti, ; Forteza, ); but it has been patchy from a comparative perspective, covering only certain countries and certain scheme types; in addition, public and occupational rights have been analysed independently of each other, leading to incomplete assessments of their intertwined nature. Moreover, consideration has focused on the impact of legislation on the preservation of pension rights, not on the impact of movement between different types of pension system and between nations of widely differing levels of wealth.…”

Section: The Benefits Of Migrationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Free Movement? The Impact of Legislation, Benefit Generosity and Wages on the Pensions of European Migrants

Meyer

Bridgen

Andow

2013

Population Space and Place

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European (EU) economic integration has always involved a commitment to the free movement of labour, services and capital. However, the development by EU institutions of specific rights with respect to labour mobility has been slow. This paper explores this issue from the perspective of pension rights, among the most long‐lasting for citizens. It shows that the literature on this topic has focussed mainly on EU regulations, their scope and limitations. The paper argues that, although important, this work has led to the neglect of a more fundamental issue: the potential impact on mobility of the relative generosity of pension schemes and large national wealth variations, an increasingly salient issue since the expansion of the EU into Eastern and Central Europe. Thus, on the basis of a detailed review of dominant intra‐EU migratory patterns, the paper investigates the impact on pension rights of movement between Beveridgean and Bismarckian pension systems and between countries of substantially different wealth. It shows that lower income workers who move from Beveridgean to Bismarckian countries would be most at risk of pension losses. However, such movement is unusual; instead, the majority of intra‐EU migrants move from Bismarckian systems of low generosity in the poorer east to Beveridgean and more generous Bismarckian in the richer west. Workers who make this move are more likely to experience pension gains than losses. For them, free movement is achieved. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Section: Portability Of Pension Rights In the Eu – Legislation And Itmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Portability Of Pension Rights In the Eu – Legislation And Itmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Benefits Of Migrationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Free Movement? The Impact of Legislation, Benefit Generosity and Wages on the Pensions of European Migrants

Meyer

Bridgen

Andow

2013

Population Space and Place

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“…There has been debate in the European Union about how far it should go in terms of the harmonisation of national social security systems, one of the issues being labour mobility across national frontiers. There seems to be a consensus that statutory national pension schemes do not impose significant portability losses within the EU, thanks to regulations that enhance portability (Schmahl, 1993;Andrietti, 2001), although occupational plans do impose such losses. According to Schmahl (1993) and Whiteford (1996), the portability of statutory pension rights seems to have been facilitated in Europe mostly through co-ordination rather than harmonisation of pension policies.…”

Section: Portability In a Regional Context: The Case Of The Eumentioning

confidence: 99%

The Portability of Pension Rights: General Principles and the Caribbean Case

Forteza

2010

Development Policy Review

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The portability of pension rights is an increasingly important issue in the Caribbean. The large and increasing flows of migrant workers, including both permanent and temporary migrants, the small size of the domestic economies and the process of regional integration and economic openness call for effective means to make pensions portable. This article presents a select survey of the literature on pension portability, and reviews the progress made by the Caribbean countries as well as some remaining challenges in the light of the international experience.

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“…Convergence of pension outcomes is not, however, an unambiguous concept. Schmahl (1993) has noted that concepts of convergence or harmonisation of pensions can be applied loosely and inconsistently to the legal structure, the public/private mix, the method of financing, the level of expenditure and the level of pension income. Most of these ambiguities are avoided in this paper by a clear focus on the level of public pension income as the sole criterion for evaluation.…”

Section: Simulation Modelling With Hypothetical Individualsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Measurement of Social Security Convergence: The Case of European Public Pension Systems since 1950

Johnson

1999

J. Soc. Pol.

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This article proposes a novel way of measuring cross-national changes over time in the outputs of social security systems. Traditional approaches to the comparative analysis of social security systems use expenditure levels, regime types or poverty and inequality rates to rank countries and map change over time. All these approaches encounter the problem of determining how much of the observed change is due to internal developments within the social security system, and how much due to exogenous social and economic factors. Taking the example of public pensions in five European countries since 1950, this article demonstrates how formal social security rules can be used in a simulation model to evaluate changes in public pension payments for a variety of hypothetical individuals characterised by different levels of lifetime income. This procedure produces direct measures of the impact of changes in social security systems which are entirely independent of exogenous developments in social and economic structures. This new method reveals the ‘pure’ effect of internal social security system development over time.

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Harmonization of Pension Schemes in Europe? A Controversial Issue in the Light of Economics

Cited by 6 publications

References 8 publications

Free Movement? The Impact of Legislation, Benefit Generosity and Wages on the Pensions of European Migrants

Free Movement? The Impact of Legislation, Benefit Generosity and Wages on the Pensions of European Migrants

The Portability of Pension Rights: General Principles and the Caribbean Case

The Measurement of Social Security Convergence: The Case of European Public Pension Systems since 1950

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