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In recent months, there have been significant changes in European pensions policy and its implementation, which affect (or afflict) employers and employees, and there is more to come. Pensions policy remains important for EU policymakers. This article suggests that opportunities for cost savings, simplification of cross-border arrangements and commercial joint ventures are becoming ever more available. Although the reform of the IORP Directive may look at first instance to be an additional barrier to provision, it might actually prove to be a catalyst for improved regulation.

Many factors play a part when comparing different pension schemes. Myths and misperceptions cloud the discussion whether employers or employees are better off with a defined benefit (DB), defined contribution (DC) or a hybrid scheme. We notice that, especially among proponents of DB schemes, some persistent misconceptions about DC schemes persist. In this article, we aim to clear up five of these myths: (i) DC schemes generate lower pensions than DB schemes, (ii) Individuals in DC schemes take poor investment decisions, (iii) Management fees in DC schemes are too high, (iv) Collectivity is lost in DC schemes, (v) Participants in DC schemes run big interest rate risks. DC pension schemes might not be a panacea to all retirement problems, but we feel a fair comparison with DB pension schemes is required.

This article provides estimates of economies of scale and scope for 200 large Australian superannuation (pension) funds using a multiple-output cost function. We separately define costs in terms of investment expenses – including investment, custodian and asset management fees – and operating expenses – comprising management, administration, actuarial, director and trustee fees/charges. The four investment outputs are cash flow-adjusted net assets, the number of investment options, the proportion of total assets in the default strategy and the 5-year rate of return for investment costs, whereas the four operating outputs are cash flow-adjusted net assets, the number of members, net contribution flows and net rollovers for operating costs. We find that economies of scale hold up to at least 300 per cent of current mean fund output in both investment and operating costs. There is little evidence that economies of scope prevail, generally reflected in the proclivity for many superannuation funds to contract out aspects of both investments and operations.

Multinational companies operate in a diverse and dynamic environment in terms of geographies, operating units, customers and their employees around the world. Although companies often spend a material portion of total compensation costs to provide benefits to their employees, they struggle at the corporate level to know what benefits they offer to reflect local market practices, how much they cost and what types of risks they pose to the enterprise. They also struggle with why, to what extent, and how corporate leaders and functions should get involved in local benefits-related decisions. Data from the 2012 Corporate Governance of Global Employee Benefits study of 140 North American- and European-based multinationals conducted by Aon Hewitt and the American Benefits Institute suggests that the business and benefits issues faced by multinational companies vary significantly for mature and emerging economies.

In February 2012, the UK minister for pensions proposed that companies should perhaps be able to provide a new type of pension – Defined Aspiration pensions or Defined Ambition (DA) pensions, as they are called in the Netherlands. In this article, we take a closer look at DA pensions, examining the Dutch experiences to date with the introduction of DA pensions. We look at what DA pensions have to offer employers and employees, and discuss whether DA pensions may provide a third way for pensions in the United Kingdom.

‘Defined Ambition’ is the latest buzzword to hit the pensions world. What does it mean, and can pension schemes run on these principles actually work? Members will need to be convinced by those running such schemes that they have the necessary skill to provide a fair outcome for all. Most importantly, a clear and stable regulatory environment, which cannot be easily overturned by future governments, will be needed to convince employers to back such schemes.

This article assesses the effectiveness of the Nigerian 2004 pension reform policy. Whereas the old pension system was seen as vulnerable, inequitable and inefficient, there was also paucity of policy and academic literature before the pension reform. Interestingly, the pension reform policy is beginning to gain attention in the literature regarding policy learning and transfer. The emerging literature, notwithstanding no systematic attempt, has been made to investigate the effectiveness of the policy, which was amended in April 2011. This article fills the gap by assessing published literature and other media sources. The article notes the achievements of the new pension scheme inspired by the Chilean model of 1981 in comparison with the old scheme. This is indicated by the development of a strong pillar for the Nigerian economy, and the growing confidence and compliance in the system. But worryingly, the new scheme is yet to cover enough grounds, including the workers in the informal economy as well as address the grafting in the industry. The article recommends the strengthening of institutions of governance to walk the path of maximum benefit for the Nigerian workers. Further research efforts are also needed on how to formalize the informal economy, how the policy is affected by privatization and the global financial crisis, and how to address the padding of ghost pensioners.

This article examines forthcoming pension fund reform in the Czech Republic. It does so in the context of the reforms that have happened in other Central and Eastern European countries. It analyses the new mandatory funded pillar and, in particular, the choices that different sections of the Czech population will have to make regarding the pillar, the contributions that will be paid to this pillar and the different types of account that will be made available. The article also analyses the changes to the voluntary pillar and, in particular, who can participate in such arrangements. The article further evaluates how funds will be established and administered, the bodies that will undertake this, the capitalisation of such bodies and where they will be entitled to invest fund assets. Finally, it examines the tax treatment of funds and the opportunities that will arise for financial institutions in relation to this sector.

The Government has introduced several policies aimed at extending working lives. One of these policies, rises in the State Pension Age (SPA), could impact on the income of older people. This article analyses the implications of extending working lives and its impact on retirement adequacy. It finds that a rise in SPA could result in higher income in retirement for those who can work longer. However, the article also finds that while around 85 per cent of people aged between 50 and SPA could achieve a Minimum Income Standard by SPA, only around 40 per cent could reach their target replacement rate. Consequently, many people may experience a drop in their standard of living when reaching their SPA, unless they are able to work and save for longer.

The changing investment and regulatory landscape has prompted pension funds to ponder their investment strategies, but there are very few studies to quantify the actuarial impact of an asset allocation shift by pension funds. In their bid to match assets and liabilities to reduce risk, more and more pension funds have taken investment strategies of swinging into bonds. The article attempts to fill the gap in the literature by quantifying the price impact and gauging the actuarial cost of such a move. We find that the inadequate bond supply may result in a statistically and economically significant impact on bond yields and an actuarially significant impact on the cost of providing pension benefits.

The review of the Institutions for Retirment Provision (or Pensions) Directive has the potential to be a defining influence on the future of pension provision in Europe. This article sets out the background to the review and brings readers up to date with recent developments.

With the advent of auto-enrolment (AE), a new type of administration is required to assist employers in fulfilling their duties under the Pensions Act 2008 and subsequent updates. Pensions administration requires administrators to look after the records of members of pension schemes, and AE administration extends this requirement to look after not only members of the scheme but also employees. Extensive reporting will be required to ensure that Employers are complying with their duties, and assistance is required to ensure that they can identify the different statuses of their workers. We are moving into a new world where employers and their payroll teams will need as much assistance from pensions administrators as they can provide to get to grips with the legislation.

In the New Era of workplace pensions, the most prominent roles will be in consumer dialogue and engagement, process engineering and a broader approach to Governance. There will still be a place for traditional technicians in legacy roles but the industry needs to attract talent with a wider range of skills to service the Google and Facebook generation, which should make a career in pensions more varied and exciting.

Madsen and Tans address longevity protection for people with Defined Contribution (DC) plans, focusing on variable retirement. The authors introduce the concept of an ‘Equilibrium Retirement Age’ and show how this increases as life expectancy rises. The authors demonstrate how an individual can achieve equilibrium between capital accumulated through work and capital required in retirement. They derive a closed-form formula for a simplified version of the equilibrium challenge and show how this can provide insight into the trade-offs a DC plan participant faces.

This article aims to prompt those who design and promote Defined Contribution pension schemes to think beyond encouraging use of the Open Market Option and consider other things that can be done to help their scheme members receive a better retirement income. The article suggests seven areas where actions can be taken to achieve this aim.

This article looks at the Dutch pension system to see what can be learnt for future pension design. The authors derive a list of 10 principles that can apply to modern age defined contribution (DC) schemes. This can be seen as an attempt to combine the good elements of defined benefit schemes with DC schemes.

This article is based on Dr Harrison's February 2012 report, ‘Treating DC members fairly in retirement?’, published jointly by the National Association of Pensions Funds and the Pensions Institute at Cass Business School. The report addresses concerns about the sub-optimal outcomes members of defined contribution (DC) schemes in the United Kingdom's private sector suffer when they buy their annuities. It suggests that although the market has the capacity to deliver better outcomes, currently it fails thousands of members, especially those with smaller funds. The report's conclusion is that unless corporate advisers, providers and regulators take action, the government will be forced to intervene. An explicit market failure will become evident when the auto-enrolment system for the private sector is phased in from October 2012, which will bring 6–8 million additional savers into the DC pensions market, most of whom will be lower earners and ‘serial default members’.

On the basis of the Bank of Spain's Survey of Household Finances for 2005, this article uses probit techniques to estimate how far the personal income tax marginal rate influences the decision of pension plan beneficiaries to opt for payout in the form of a lump sum or a life annuity. In the first place, the article concludes that it is probable savers will not become aware of the effects of taxation on the form of payouts until the contingency covered by the pension plan (retirement) arises. Second, our results suggest that savers’ decisions may be short-sighted, as they are often more concerned to defer the payment of income tax than they are to choose the alternative that will optimise their tax liabilities.

This article presents econometric evidence from Health and Retirement Study on the role that investment choice plays in the participants’ saving levels in the defined contribution (DC) pensions. I distinguish the effect of unconstrained investment choice from the one constrained in company stocks. My preferred estimates indicate that participants with investment choice contribute over three percentage points more of their salary into the DC plan than people without choice, and people constrained in company stocks contribute about three percentage points less in their retirement saving account.

In a contribution to Pensions: An International Journal, Prof. Jan Kuné discusses whether a fully funded (FF) pension scheme can cope with a demographic shock better than a payas- you-go (PAYG) system. He makes ample use of my own contributions on this issue but ignores my criticism of the neoclassical interpretation of FF pension schemes and especially of the claim that an FF scheme is superior to PAYG in this and other respects. The purpose of this note is to stimulate some response, from Prof. Kuné or others, to my critique of the neoclassical interpretation. The policy implications of this discussion for pension reforms are evident.

This article examines Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation (PBGC) premium development, claims experience and the PBGC's net financial position to determine the credibility of premiums charged for coverage from 1994 to 2010. A retrospective premium model is presented that analyzes variations in flat and variable rate premiums as exogenous factors in accumulating PBGC's net financial position. The retrospective model considers a US$35 flat premium per participant, doubling the variable rate, or increasing the flat premium to $50 over the study period. A $35 flat premium would have been insufficient to meet historical losses from 1994 to 2010. A combination $35 premium, plus a doubling of variable revenues would have been modestly adequate producing a $791 million deficit in 2010. However, a $50 flat premium produces adequate development of the PBGC fund resulting in a $2.1 billion surplus by 2010. The findings of this study provide evidence that current PBGC premiums appear inadequate for meeting future claims based on historical experience from 1994 to 2010. However, a combination of flat and variable rate increases that reflect the true cost of coverage based on PBGC's incurred losses may move PGBC towards an adequate rate structure.

Most literature about retirement planning treats the working (accumulation) and retirement (decumulation) phases separately. The traditional approach decides on safe withdrawal rate, uses it to derive a wealth accumulation target, and then calculates the savings rate required to achieve this wealth target. Because low sustainable withdrawal rates tend to occur after bull markets, such a formulation will push individuals toward unnecessarily high savings rates to attain their desired retirement spending goals, reducing their feasible lifestyle prior to retirement. By jointly considering both phases of retirement planning, this study provides savings rate guidelines for individuals in 25 emerging market countries. The savings rates calculated here are those which provide an adequate success rate in financing desired retirement expenditures using bootstrapped Monte Carlo simulations. For many emerging market countries, these savings rates will be high, given the high volatility of returns for savings instruments and the inflationary environment. Starting to save early and using a relatively low stock allocation, a finding that contrasts with studies about the United States, provide the lowest necessary savings rate for a given probability of success.

This article focuses on the development of outsourcing arrangements by pension trustees, evolving from different types of providers into what is commonly known today as fiduciary management. This evolution is put into a historical context, with its beginnings in the United States, progression in the Netherlands and its expansion in the United Kingdom. Trustee attitudes over the past decade are examined, with an observation that there is almost begrudging acceptance in 2011 that the approach may have some relevance in the management of today's UK corporate pension schemes. The pros and cons of this solution are explored, including the difficulties associated with appointing a fiduciary manager, and the importance of good governance, monitoring and challenge. Finally, the reader is asked to ponder on the changing business model of the investment consultant and to reflect on the importance of an emerging role for the non-conflicted, independent investment adviser.

The UK Government has removed the effective requirement to purchase a lifetime annuity with private Defined Contribution (DC) pension savings by the age of 75 years. People will still be able to purchase an annuity if they wish to but will no longer be required to purchase an annuity with their remaining private money-purchase pension fund by the age of 75 years. People with high levels of pension savings may be able to withdraw some or all of their private DC pension savings in unlimited amounts if they can demonstrate that they can meet the Government's Minimum Income Requirement (MIR) by having a secure pension income, in payment and guaranteed for life, of at least £20 000 per year (in 2011). In addition, individuals will be able to use income drawdown beyond the age of 75 years, to invest their funds and withdraw income from their private pension savings within certain limits set by the Government (Capped Drawdown.) The new rules will give private pension savers in the United Kingdom greater flexibility over how they convert their pension fund into a retirement income. However, the introduction of greater flexibility is accompanied by potential risks for individuals. In particular, individuals who invest their entire pension savings in capped drawdown and remain invested throughout their retirement run greater investment risk and longevity risk than those who use some or all of their pension savings to purchase an annuity. In 2010, the vast majority of people aged between 55 and 75 years would not have had a large enough private pension pot to be able to bear the investment and longevity risks associated with capped drawdown and would not have been able to meet the MIR. The Government will need to ensure that people have access to understandable, appropriate and accessible advice and information to ensure that they understand both the potential upsides, but also the inherent risks involved in accessing private DC pension savings more flexibly. This article is intended as a contribution to the policy debate about pensions and retirement provision. Individuals should not rely on it in making their own decisions about their own pension fund, as individual circumstances will vary.

This article summarises the implications for private pension policy of a 3-year study by Britain's oldest ‘think tank’, the Royal Society for Arts (RSA). It finds that the proper design of a private, funded pension system can add 50 per cent or more to pension outcomes. Few countries have designed and implemented an ideal system, and in consequence there is a significant loss in the productivity of savings and the adequacy of pensions. The article focuses mainly on the situation in the United Kingdom, but incorporates research and examples from around the world. It will be of interest to those involved in the reform and regulation of pension systems in developed markets, and to those involved in the establishment of such systems in the developing world. The RSA's work began by asking pension savers what benefits they sought from the saving system. Through discussion in ‘citizen juries’, it became apparent that most savers did not want a high degree of individual choice. Rather, they wanted a system that could be trusted to make choices on their behalf. Subsequent research suggests that, if properly managed, such trustworthy systems are capable of a high degree of productivity. In economic terms, where there is asymmetric information and principle agent contracting for delivery of long-term benefits, institutional design can make very large differences to outcomes. The work sets private pension policy within the broader context that pension policy makers face. It then goes on to describe an ‘ideal’ pension system, which would have the following characteristics: (i) pensions savings would be collected through some form of auto-enrolment; (ii) pensions institutions would be of a size to benefit from economies of scale; (iii) they would be trustee governed; (iv) their funds would be responsibly and collectively invested; and (v) that the pension ‘promise’ is flexible enough to allow for unanticipated changes in the liability and investment in an appropriate portfolio of investments. Although few countries meet this ideal, in Europe, both Holland and Denmark approximate to it. We note that these countries are generally judged to have some of the best pension provision in the world, and have a significantly different institutional design to that found in other developed markets, particularly the USA. The article notes that, in the United Kingdom there has been a drift away from the ideal design of a private pension system. As a result of a desire to avoid unaffordable pension promises, low-cost, collective and trust-based sytems have been wound down. Recent government policy initiatives have sought to reverse this trend, but their success is dangerously threatened by a lack of focus on the details of institutional design and pension regulation.

The Dutch pension system is generally looked upon with admiration. It scores higher marks for level of participation, level of pension income and sustainability than retirement provisions of most other countries. The Dutch state retirement pension is funded as a pay-as-you-go scheme, second-pillar pensions are collectively funded and third-pillar annuities have a fully funded basis too. The Dutch retirement reserve equals more than 100 per cent of the country's GDP and 90 per cent of the workforce is entitled to a corporate pension. The Dutch practice of a 50/50 split between pay-as-you-go and funded schemes gives a robust and balanced outcome for beneficiaries. The ‘EET’-system, that is, where pension contributions are exempt, accruals to the pension fund are exempt and actual pension income is taxed at the moment of payout, ensures that the tax revenue collected keeps pace with the ageing of the beneficiaries. Nevertheless, the Dutch system also has come under pressure where the Netherlands has to take measures like any other country. And this pressure, partly caused by the ageing population combined with the current and foreseeable economic conditions, painfully shows some of the shortcomings of the Dutch system. Does the Netherlands actually still have the world's best pension system? Maybe the Netherlands used to have sufficiently funded and well-organized pension schemes up until now, but this seems to be rapidly changing. This article intends to provide inspiring examples of dos and donts, which will give more insight in the Dutch system and could be useful for pension practitioners and policymakers in other countries.

By communicating in an effective, personalised and engaging manner, the pensions industry should aim to restore a national culture of saving.

This study focuses on identifying the fiscal consequences of the current public pension scheme of the civil servants in the Republic of Cyprus and the mechanisms of governing the benefits offered to its members. The article explores the implications of the economic impacts of the scheme on the budget expenditures. The projections presented point out the fiscal positions of the scheme under the current arrangements, up to the year 2070. The sustainable fiscal stance and projected liabilities are also presented. The empirical evidence reveals that the public pension scheme in Cyprus can generate undesirable and widely distributed economic impacts. The results suggest that the public pension scheme, if it continues to function on the basis of the existing mechanisms of governance, will affect the whole of the economy in a negative way. The article concludes that effective institutional intervention with successful reforms of the Scheme will benefit the budgetary balance of the Republic of Cyprus. The policy implications are underlined and suggestions are given for the development of the public pension scheme in Cyprus. Finally, it concludes and gives some implications for further research.

Over the recent years, demographic trends in Western countries have shown the need to reform public pension systems; the result is that complementary pension systems, mainly represented by pension plans, have experienced global development. This is particularly remarkable in countries such as Italy, where, after some reforms of the public pension system, a mixed system has been adopted, which has made contributions to occupational pension plans compulsory. In this article, we show how these reforms influence the Italian pension market and are able to stimulate the national economy, even during times of crisis, like the present.

This article analyzes the newly introduced three-tier pension scheme in Ghana, showing that major transformation in the country's overall pension system was the insertion of two private – mandatory and voluntary – pillars to the existing social insurance scheme. The analysis shows that although private pensions were projected as instruments for giving individual citizens choice and freedom over their retirement decisions, the design of the three-tier scheme in Ghana has several risks and institutional weaknesses that can compromise the income security of the aged. Thus, it argues for the need to reform the new scheme by (a) establishing a statutory pension benefit insurance; (b) scaling back the number of pension service providers; (c) capping amount of each contributors’ funds that service providers can spend on administrative issues; and (d) activating constitutional provisions on social assistance to augment the three-tier model.

The EU Directive on the activities and supervision of institutions for occupational retirement provision was originally envisaged as a mechanism to facilitate pension planning across the EU for pan-European employers. One of the main objectives of the Directive was to allow pension funds to benefit from the Internal Market principles of free movement of capital and free provision of services. As such, the Directive enables the management of occupational pension funds for companies established in one Member State to operate across the EU, allowing a pan-European company to have just one pension fund for all its subsidiaries all over Europe. It also put in place minimum prudential standards, which are designed to ensure that pension fund members and beneficiaries are properly protected. However, take-up of cross-border IORPs has fallen well below expectations. This article examines some of the different approaches adopted for identification and recognition of pan-European pension funds, and considers the impact of such approaches in encouraging (or otherwise) cross-border activity.

Trustees and employers are increasingly looking at the various de-risking options available to help manage the £1 trillion liabilities in UK defined benefit pension schemes. This article investigates why there is an increasing appetite for de-risking, including the challenges faced by schemes as a result of increasing costs, longevity trends and accounting practices. De-risking exercises can take many different forms and can be tailored to an individual scheme's de-risking goals, trustee and company budgets, and relevant economic conditions. A number of options available to schemes are highlighted in this article and the concept of ‘flightpath’ (a designated plan that enables a scheme to reach buyout over a period of time) is explored. The ultimate end goal of securing pension scheme benefits for the lifetime of members and their beneficiaries is in the interest of all stakeholders involved. Through good communication and planning, the relevant steps can be taken to reduce risk in a pension scheme, while understanding that any plan needs to be adaptable as inevitably situations will arise that require manual intervention or a change in direction.

An aging society with an absolutely or relatively declining labour force can – with constant capital intensity – experience a reduction in the national capital stock thereby in the short-term disengaging resources, which can be transferred to the elderly for consumption purposes. Hence, net savings are negative: dissavings of the pensioners exceed savings of the working-age population. An aging society can indeed survive by ‘eating up part of its capital stock’ for some time.

In the backdrop of a world with an ageing population and increasing life expectancy, the impact of the global financial crisis on the values of pension and superannuation funds has underscored the vulnerability of the wealth pool of retirees and their well-being during retirement. In light of this, it is important to examine how the design and delivery of retirement savings and income products can address these vulnerabilities. The purpose of this article is to review and evaluate the factors that need to be considered and the features that need to be incorporated in designing and developing retirement savings and retirement income products to address the concerns of investors, both in the accumulation and draw down phases of retirement investment management.

To date, investment risk has largely been the Cinderella of Defined Contribution (DC) investment default design – at least in the growth phase of the journey – with its more glamorous sister, investment return, tending to steal the limelight. But all this has changed in the wake of the recent financial market turmoil. Investment risk is now fast becoming the belle of the ball. Part of the reason behind this relative neglect of investment risk is the fact that it has not really been fully understood or defined in an appropriate way for DC savings. Taking a long-term, perhaps over 30–40 years, view and modelling the level and variability of outcomes has generally always suggested that the price of managing risk has always been too great for the benefit that it brings. Lifestyling has traditionally been the medicine for dealing with investment risk, which is fine in the run up to retirement, although lifestyle programmes and glide-path designs can be greatly improved where the additional complexity can outweigh the operational cost that it brings. Traditionally, however, lifestyling has done little to manage risk for those members who are not in this pre-retirement phase of their life. In this short opinion piece, we go back to basics and redefine investment risk in a DC context, suggesting new DC-specific measures to help us get a handle on investment risk, and exploring how DC plan fiduciaries can assess how much risk should be built into a default investment programme and how a defaulting member's exposure to that risk can be more effectively managed over their DC journey. We hypothecate that DC plan fiduciaries have a vital role to play and that they need to subtly, but quite fundamentally change the way that they approach the setting of their default investment strategy – focusing more on understanding their membership, its retirement outcome objectives, its investment return needs and its investment risk tolerances, as well as focusing more on managing the default programme more proactively against some clear strategic objectives.

This article discusses the main challenges facing earnings-related pension systems in Europe and explores the roles of the financial sector, employers, national governments and the EU in addressing these challenges. The internal market and a deeper European capital market can help create a richer set of building blocks to build greater retirement security for European citizens. Governments should facilitate intergenerational risk sharing by issuing wage-indexed and longevity bonds. The financial sector must provide better retirement products. In particular, during the accumulation phase, interest rate and inflation risks should be managed with the pay-out phase already in mind. During the pay-out phase, annuity, health and care insurance should be optimized, using various securities supplied by governments. Employers can provide a valuable platform for transforming human capital in financial capital during the accumulation phase. They can also help to treasure the human capital of workers and to reinvent the retirement process.

As one of the oldest and largest national mandatory defined contribution pension systems, Singapore's Central Provident Fund (CPF) permits employees to invest their retirement accumulations in a variety of investment instruments rather than leaving them in a government-managed investment fund. Many plan participants avail themselves of this opportunity, selecting from a menu of more than 200 ‘included’ funds that satisfy specific admission criteria set by the CPF Board. Nevertheless, many other funds are excluded from the list of eligible retirement system investments. This article shows that the ‘included/non-included’ screening criteria have been effective, in that included fund managers earned higher average returns, demonstrated better stock-picking and displayed better market-timing skills, than their excluded fund counterparts. In addition, the included funds exhibited stronger persistence in performance, though they offered marginally lower diversification benefits to plan participants.

Peter Askins, former head of Defined Benefits Pensions Policy at the UK Department of Work and Pensions, examines the prospects for future pensions policy in the European Community. Focussing on the effects of increasing longevity, the baby boom generation, regulation and globalisation, he looks at the challenges facing policymakers and pension providers in terms of sustainability, risk and communicating the need for change in Europe with an ageing population and falling birth rates.

Recent pension policy developments in the United Kingdom have mostly focussed on helping people to accumulate assets to fund retirement. Although there has been some research on the use of assets in retirement, most of the research has examined particular assets in isolation. However, less is known and has been considered about what individuals actually need income and assets for in retirement, and how needs might change as retirement progresses. Recent work by the Pensions Policy Institute has brought together assessments of pensioners needs in retirement with evidence about future trends in different sources of income and assets. The findings from this research present some interesting and difficult challenges for future policy.