 Facts and figures about UK taxes, benefits and public spending.
Income distribution, poverty and inequality.
Analysing government fiscal forecasts and tax and spending.
Analysis of the fiscal choices an independent Scotland would face.
Case studies that give a flavour of the areas where IFS research has an impact on society.
Reforming the tax system for the 21st century.
A peer-reviewed quarterly journal publishing articles by academics and practitioners.
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The unexpectedly rapid ageing of the population makes it urgent that we design a system that will encourage those who can provide for their own retirement while helping those who reach the end of their working lives with insufficient wealth to sustain what society regards as an acceptable standard of living. These objectives frequently - and perhaps inherently - conflict. In dealing as best they can with the inevitable trade-offs, policymakers need to have three important questions (among many others) in mind.
First, is the financial support offered to pensioners by the state in retirement sustainable in terms of the burden it places on the working population, who pick up most of the bill in the form of taxation? Second, are the mechanisms by which the private financial sector helps people save for retirement sustainable in the sharing of risk between employers and employees? And, third, is the way in which the state and private systems interact sustainable in the sense that the combination promises people a reasonable degree of financial security without creating unduly powerful disincentives for them to work and save? Research in this area looks at these questions. We look in detail at the impact of various government reforms and proposals for reform to the pension system. Search
This paper considers the relevance of a set of generational accounts in informing policy debate in the UK.
Richard Disney, Robert Palacios and Edward Whitehouse
The paper examines social security (public pension) reforms in which the programme is partially shifted from a public unfunded basis to a private, prefunded, basis.
Richard Disney and Sarah Tanner
This paper analyses retirement expectations and outcomes using the two waves of the UK Retirement Survey, undertaken in 1988-89 and 1994.
Richard Disney, Carl Emmerson and Sarah Tanner
This commentary assesses the government's proposals. It provides a detailed description of the current pension system and asks whether there is a case for reform. It looks at how much pensioners are likely to benefit from the Minimum Income Guarantee and how the new State Second Pension compares with SERPS. It evaluates the government's plans for Stakeholder Pensions and presents new evidence on the employment, earnings and other savings of the people whom the government sees as targets for Stakeholder Pensions.
Sarah Tanner
This paper uses data from the two waves of the UK Retirement Survey to present a detailed descriptive analysis of the retirement behaviour of older men.
Paul Johnson, Gary Stears and Steven Webb
This paper uses two waves of the UK Retirement Survey to look at how incomes change during retirment.
In this paper we begin by describing the labour market behaviour of individuals around pension age.
Labor force participation of men over age 50 fell sharply in the UK between the early 1970s and early 1990s.
Costas Meghir and Edward Whitehouse
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 Started: 01 February 2012
Started: 01 January 2012
Started: 11 April 2011
Started: 01 May 2004
Started: 01 May 2004
   Past research into pension reform has contributed to evidence given to government on public service pensions.
Reform of the complex French state pension system was informed by recommendations by IFS researchers.
IFS researchers present and discuss new research on retirement saving with a group of business leaders and policy makers.
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