Publications
Journal articlesUnderstanding pensions: cognitive function, numerical ability and retirement saving
01 Jun 2007, Journal Articles
In a world of declining state pension provision, it is becoming increasingly important that individuals are able to understand the financial choices they face and can choose savings products, portfolios and contribution rates accordingly.
 More information Economic capabilities, choices and outcomes at older ages
29 Aug 2006, Journal Articles
This paper presents an overview of the beginnings of a research agenda targeted towards increasing the empirical evidence on economic issues related to ageing in England and providing extensive data for subsequent research.
More information Disease and disadvantage in the United States and in England
03 May 2006, Journal Articles
This articles sets out to assess the relative heath status of older individuals in England and the United States, especially how their health status varies by important indicators of socioeconomic position.
More information The balance between defined benefit, defined contribution and state provision
01 Apr 2005, Journal Articles
We examine the possible consequences of the increasing shift from Defined Benefit to Defined Contribution arrangements for private pensions.
More information Public pension reform in the United Kingdom: what effect on the financial well-being of current and future pensioners?
30 Mar 2005, Journal Articles
This paper examines the effect of reforms to the public pension programme in the United Kingdom on the state retirement incomes of current generations of pensioners and on the prospective state incomes of future generations of pensioners.
More information Effectiveness of tax incentives to boost (retirement) saving: theoretical motivation and empirical evidence
04 Feb 2005, Journal Articles
The adequacy of household saving for retirement has become a policy issue all around the world.
More information Pension wealth and household saving: evidence from pension reforms in the United Kingdom
01 Dec 2003, Journal Articles
Using three major UK pension reforms as natural experiments we investigate the relationship between pension saving and discretionary private savings.
More information Mortality, health status and wealth
01 Jun 2003, Journal Articles
In this paper we use the two waves of the British Retirement Survey (1988/1989 and 1994) to quantify the relationship between socioeconomic status and health outcomes.
More information Privatising provision and attacking poverty? The direction of UK pension policy under new Labour
01 Mar 2003, Journal Articles
This paper analyses the thrust of the UK Government’s pension reforms in the context of the system they inherited.
More information Pension incentives and the pattern of early retirement
09 Nov 2002, Journal Articles
Using a sample of individuals from the UK Retirement Survey, the paper models the probability of retirement in terms of the incentives underlying the individual's pension plan as well as other socio-economic factors.
More information Public and private pension spending: principles, practice and the need for reform
01 Mar 2000, Journal Articles
This paper surveys the issue of public spending on pensions.
More information A note on the tax treatment of private pensions and Individual Savings Accounts
01 Mar 2000, Journal Articles
The UK government is planning to introduce stakeholder pensions from April 2001 as an alternative to existing personal pensions for people on moderate earnings.
More information Books, reports and briefing notesRetirement, health and relationships of the older population in England: THE 2004 ENGLISH LONGITUDINAL STUDY OF AGEING (Wave 2)
07 Jul 2006, Books
This report covers the second wave of data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, a survey of people of 50 and over in England.
More information Prepared for retirement? The adequacy and distribution of retirement resources in England
11 Oct 2005, IFS Reports, R67
This report provides new empirical evidence on the level and distribution of retirement saving in England.
More information Perspectives on the economics of ageing
01 Nov 2004, Books
Contributions from each country involved in the NBER network for research into the economics of ageing.
More information Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: Micro-Estimation
01 Nov 2004, Books
Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World represents the second stage of an ongoing research project studying the relationship between social security and labour.
More information Pensions, pensioners and pensions policy: financial security in UK retirement savings?
02 Mar 2004, IFS Briefing Notes, BN48
This paper was presented at a seminar organised by the Economic and Social Research Council. It asks whether it is possible to design a pension system that can guarantee financial security to individuals, employers and to the state simultaneously.
More information Two cheers for the Pension Credit?
01 Oct 2003, IFS Briefing Notes, BN39
On 6 October 2003, the pension credit replaced the minimum income guarantee as the principal means-tested benefit for families containing an individual aged 60 or over. This Briefing Note examines the impact of this reform.
More information Sharing in the nation’s prosperity? Pensioner poverty in Britain
01 Apr 2003, IFS Commentaries, C093
This commentary reviews the government’s tax and benefit reforms affecting pensioners to date, and examines the evidence from the latest official low income figures on the government’s record on pensioner poverty so far.
More information Retirement, pensions and the adequacy of saving: A guide to the debate
01 Oct 2002, IFS Briefing Notes, BN29
This briefing note assembles the existing microeconomic evidence and sets out economic arguments relating to the current debate on the ageing population, the timing of retirement, and the adequacy of financial provision for retirement in the UK.
More information The tax and benefit system and the decision to invest in a stakeholder pension
01 Aug 2002, IFS Briefing Notes, BN28
This briefing note looks at the interaction of the tax and benefit system with stakeholder pensions. In particular, it asks how, in the light of recent reforms to the system of state pension provision, the welfare system differentially affects the incentive to invest in a stakeholder scheme for various groups in the population.
More information Rewarding saving and alleviating poverty? The final pension credit proposals
01 Feb 2002, IFS Briefing Notes, BN22
In Autumn 2001, the government finalised its proposals for the introduction of the Pension Credit in 2003. Since the initial plans, the Government has significantly changed the way in which pensioners' savings will be treated by the new benefit, and has also decided to couple the reform to significant increases in the generosity of housing benefit for pensioners. This paper updates earlier IFS research evaluating these modified proposals, asking who is likely to gain, and assessing the likely effect on pensioner poverty, on savings incentives and on the public finances. We conclude that modifications to the reform leave the policy better able to reward saving and fitting in better with the rest of UK pension policy. In the longer-term, however, there large questions about the eventual cost and effects of the reform that remain unanswered.
More information Recent pensions policy and the Pension Credit
01 Feb 2001, IFS Briefing Notes, BN17
In the November 2000 Pre-Budget Report, the government announced a major range of measures for pensioners. Some come into operation in April 2001, while others follow in 2002 and 2003. The most important aspects of the package comprised: above-inflation increases in the retirement pension; substantially above-inflation increases in the means-tested minimum income guarantee (MIG); and the introduction of a new element into the means-tested benefit system for pensioners, known as the pension credit. Overall, the package means the government will pay over £4 billion a year extra to pensioners (2000 prices) by 2003–04. It represents a very substantial redistribution in favour of pensioners, and particularly those on low incomes.
More information The role of information in saving decisions
01 Feb 2000, IFS Briefing Notes, BN07
This note looks at the kind of information people have on saving and how this effects their decisions to invest in the future. We also ask what policies could be used to provide people with clear information which they trust.
More information UK annuitants
01 Dec 1999, IFS Briefing Notes, BN05
In this briefing note we add to the current debate on UK annuity markets by providing some simple descriptive analysis from household survey data. In particular, using data from recent waves of the Family Resources Survey, we consider how the current population of (elderly) annuitants differs from the elderly population at large, and describe differences in the characteristics of the group holding voluntary, as opposed to mandatory annuity policies.
More information Stakeholder pensions
01 Oct 1999, IFS Briefing Notes, BN01
The government published its first plans for stakeholder pensions in December 1998. Since then more flesh has been put on the bones with the publication of six disussion papers each focusing on a different aspects of stakeholder pensions — the minimum standards, the employer access requirement, the clearing arrangements, regulation, advice and information, governance and the tax regime. This note summarises - and critically appraises - the government's proposals
More information Working papersTax reform and retirement saving incentives: evidence from the introduction of stakeholder pensions in the UK
27 Nov 2007, IFS Working Papers, W07/19
We examine the impact of recent reforms on private pension coverage and on contributions to personal pension accounts.
More information Pension provision and retirement saving: lessons from the United Kingdom
01 Feb 2007, Externally published reports
We describe the trajectory of pension reform in the United Kingdom.
More information The importance of incentives in influencing private retirement saving: known knowns and known unknowns
06 Apr 2006, IFS Working Papers, W06/09
We summarise what economic theory predicts about how retirement savings decisions are affected by marginal withdrawal rates created by the tax, tax credit and benefit system, and by the information individuals are provided with.
More information Understanding pensions: cognitive function, numerical ability and retirement saving
27 Mar 2006, IFS Working Papers, W06/05
In this paper we look at numerical ability and other dimensions of cognitive function in a sample of older adults in England and examine the extent to which these abilities are correlated with various measures of wealth and retirement saving outcomes.
More information Preparing for retirement: the pension arrangements and retirement expectations of those approaching state pension age in England
18 Jul 2005, IFS Working Papers, W05/13
This paper provides a detailed analysis of individuals in households in England aged between 50 and the State Pension Age in terms of their private pension arrangements and current non-pension assets alongside their expectations of future economic circumstances.
More information Estimating pension wealth of ELSA respondents
17 May 2005, IFS Working Papers, W05/09
This paper explains the methodology used for calculating pension wealth for all individuals in the first wave of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA).
More information Fiscal effects of reforming the UK state pension system
01 Jul 2003, IFS Working Papers, W03/13
The fiscal and distributive impacts of three reforms to the social security pension system in the UK are evaluated.
More information Ill health and retirement in Britain: a panel data based analysis
01 Feb 2003, IFS Working Papers, W03/02
We examine the role of ill-health in retirement decisions in Britain, using the first eight waves of the British Household Panel Survey (1991-98).
More information The distribution of financial wealth in the UK: evidence from 2000 BHPS data
03 Nov 2002, IFS Working Papers, W02/21
More information Choice of pension scheme and job mobility in Britain
30 May 2002, IFS Working Papers, W02/09
This paper examines the choice of pension scheme and job mobility in Britain.
More information Noisy share prices and the Q model of investment
02 Sep 2001, IFS Working Papers, W01/22
We consider to what extent the empirical failings of the Q model of investment can be attributed to the use of share prices to measure average q.
More information Pension wealth and household saving: evidence from pension reforms in the UK
01 Sep 2001, IFS Working Papers, W01/21
Using three major UK pension reforms as natural experiments we investigate the relationship between pension saving and discretionary private savings.
More information Differential mortality in the UK
01 Jun 2001, IFS Working Papers, W01/16
In this paper we use the two waves of the British Retirement Survey (1988/89 and 1994) to quantify the relationship between socio-economic status and health outcomes.
More information Wealth inequality in the United States and Great Britain
03 Nov 2000, IFS Working Papers, W00/20
In this paper we describe the household wealth distribution in the US and UK, and compare both wealth inequality and the form in which wealth is held.
More information Household portfolios in the UK
01 Jul 2000, IFS Working Papers, W00/14
This paper presents a detailed analysis of the composition of household portfolios, using both aggregate and micro-data.
More information The abolition of the earnings rule for UK pensioners
02 Jun 2000, IFS Working Papers, W00/13
Using data from the Family Expenditure Survey we show that the abolition of the earnings rule in the UK increased the number of hours worked by men.
More information Choice of private pension plan and pension benefits in the UK
26 Oct 1994, IFS Working Papers, W94/02
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