Pension protection for women:

global challenges and opportunities

Dr Athina Vlachantoni
Centre for Research on Ageing and Centre for Population Change
University of Southampton, United Kingdom

Email: a.vlachantoni@soton.ac.uk
The views expressed in this presentation are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Asian Development Bank (ADB),
or its Board of Governors, or the governments they represent. ADB does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this paper and accepts no
responsibility for any consequence of their use. The countries listed in this paper do not imply any view on ADB's part as to sovereignty or independent status
or necessarily conform to ADB's terminology.
Paper outline
• Pension protection in the 21st century

• Pension protection: why is it a challenge for

women?

• Factors affecting income security in low-

income countries

• Conclusion: policy responses

2
Pension protection in the 21st century
Principles of pension protection
Pension systems generally perform three functions:

1) Consumption-smoothing

How do we safeguard consumption across the lifecourse?

2) Insurance against longevity ‘risk’

How do we ensure we don’t outlive our resources?

3) Redistribution (and poverty reduction)

How do we target the oldest and the poorest?

4
Fig. 1: Income and consumption
over the lifecourse

Income

Consumption

Age →

‘Normal’ Insecure Lifecourse

lifecourse lifecourse In poverty

Source: Adjusted from Barrientos (2004) in Lloyd-Sherlock (ed) Living

Longer. Zed Books. 5
Fig. 2: Decreasing fertility
worldwide
8

5 World
More Dev
4
Less Dev
3 Least Dev

0
50

60

70

80

90

00

10

20

30

40
19

19

19

19

19

20

20

20

20

Source: World Population Prospects, The 2008 Revision Population Database 20

6
Fig. 3: But significant variations,
eg. Asia
7

5
Asia
4 E.Asia
S.C.Asia
3 S.E. Asia
W. Asia
2

0
19 955

19 965

19 975

19 985

20 995

20 005

20 015

20 025

20 035

5
04
-1

-1

-1

-1

-1

-2

-2

-2

-2

-2
50

60

70

80

90

00

10

20

30

40
19

Source: World Population Prospects, The 2008 Revision Population Database 7

‘Ageing, architect of our future’
Fig. 4: Population pyramids in the Philippines:
1980 and 2050 projection

8
Source: US Census Bureau online at: www.census.org
Pension protection – why is it a
challenge for women in particular?
Women and pensions
Higher life expectancy

+ Care (children, adults)

+ Interrupted, part-time, low-paid (formal) employment

+ Pension design with (dis)incentives to join

= Inadequate (individual) pension income

= Higher poverty risk (for longer)

10
Women and pensions
Higher life expectancy

+ Care (children, adults)

+ Interrupted, part-time, low-paid (formal) employment

+ Pension design with (dis)incentives to join

+ Informal employment which does not yield a pension

= Inadequate (individual) pension income

= Higher poverty risk (for longer)

11
Fig. 5: Life expectancy at birth,
by sex
Western Asia

S.E. Asia

S.C. Asia

E.Asia

Asia

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Women Men
12
Source: World Population Prospects, The 2008 Revision Population Database
Fig. 6: Labour market
participation, by gender
100

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
Malaysia Indonesia Cambodia Fiji The Singapore
Philippines

Women Men
13
Source: World Bank Database (2008 data)
Informal employment
Fig. 7: Informal employment
• Informal employment comprises
between half and three-quarters as a proportion of all non-
of all non-agricultural agricultural employment
employment in developing
80
countries
70
• Women are over-represented 60
among informal workers: 50

85% of all women in Sub-Saharan 40

Africa 30

20
65% of all women in Asia
10
58% of all women in L. America 0
North Africa Latin America Asia S.Saharan
Africa

14
Source: International Labour Organization (2002)
Factors affecting income security in
old age
• Living arrangements

- The majority of older people in developing regions live

with their children or grandchildren

- (but note the impact of demographic changes)

• Intergenerational support

-Such support goes in both directions and is an important

safety net

• Migration patterns

-Out migration, older people “left behind” and the

importance of remittances
16
Fig. 8: Living arrangements of older people
(60 and over) in developed and developing countries

17
Source: UN, 2005
Fig. 9: Living arrangements of older people
(60 and over) in Africa, Asia, L. America and the Caribbean

18
Source: UN, 2005
Fig. 10: Proportion of older people
living with their children

19
Fig. 11: Percentage of Elders Living with
An Adult Child, by Region and Gender

Source: Bongaarts and Zimmer 2002 20

• Living arrangements

- The majority of older people in developing regions live

with their children or grandchildren

- (but note the impact of demographic changes)

• Intergenerational support

-Such support goes in both directions and is an important

safety net

• Migration patterns

-Out migration, older people “left behind” and the

importance of remittances
21
Fig. 12: Proportion of people aged 40 and
over providing and receiving support
Globally:

…one-third of those in
their 40s and 50s and

one-quarter of those in
their 60s and 70s

…have provided practical

support to a relative or
friend over the previous six
months.
Source: The Future of Retirement 2007.
HSBC
http://www.hsbc.com/1/2/retirement/futur
22
e-of-retirement
• Living arrangements

- The majority of older people in developing regions live

with their children or grandchildren

- (but note the impact of demographic changes)

• Intergenerational support

-Such support goes in both directions and is an important

safety net

• Migration patterns

-Out migration, older people “left behind” and the

importance of remittances
23
Migration and remittances
Fig. 13: Top 3 migrant sending
countries in the world • Remittances flows sent
(diaspora in millions)
by migrants reached
40 $414 million in 2009.
35

30 • Of this, about 73% (or

25
$316 million) was sent
to low-income
20

15

10
countries.
5
Source: World Bank's Migration and
0 Development Brief 12 (April 23, 2010):
China India The Philippines Outlook for Remittance Flows 2010-11,
http://go.worldbank.org/SSW3DDNLQ0
Source: World Migration 2005.
24
Policy responses
Pension security in old age
• Contributory

-state pension (PAYG/ funded/ hybrid)

-occupational pension

-personal pension

• Non-contributory

-means-tested

-universal (social pensions)

• Other (savings, home ownership, access to health, family

support, community support)
26
Fig. 14: Social pensions: regions
and coverage

27
Source: Help Age International online at: www.helpage.org (May 2010)
Examples
Bolivia: Mutual Health Insurance Scheme which covers basic health
services for its members, half of whom are informal economy workers
excluded from other social security systems.

Brazil: Rural Social Insurance Programme which is a state-sponsored

social protection programme for those outside the formal sector. The
programme is a non-contributory pension and disability programme
for the rural poor, instituted by the 1988 Constitution that extended
basic pension benefits to the old and disabled in informal rural
employment.

Japan: The National Pension System provides health and pension

insurance for more than 90 per cent of people, including informal
workers. Japan does not distinguish between the formal and informal
economy or between self-employed workers and those in micro-
enterprises.

28
Source: Lund and Srinivas, 2000
Further reading
• Help Age International at: www.helpage.org
• Institute of Development Studies at: www.ids.ac.uk
• Lloyd-Sherlock, P. (ed.) (2004) Living longer. Ageing, Development
and Social Protection. London: Zed Books.
• Lund, F. and Srinivas, S. (2000) Learning from experience: a gendered
approach to social protection for workers in the informal economy.
Paris: ILO.
• Mesa-Lago, C. (2002) Myth and reality of pension reform: the Latin
American evidence. World Development 30 (8): 1309-1321.
• Robalino et al (2005) Pensions in the Middle East and North Africa:
Time for change. Washington DC: World Bank.
• Yeates, N. and Holden, C. (eds.)(2009) The global social policy reader.
Bristol: Policy Press.

29
Thank you