OECD Seminar on Reforming Protection Benefit Schemes - 2 July 2007

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The issue of how to protect company pensions has returned to the foreground of both economic and political debate in many OECD countries, following the high profile losses of pension benefits due to firms going bankrupt and leaving their pension schemes underfunded. To address this, some governments have put in place benefit protection schemes. But how effective are these schemes? Could they be improved and, if so, should more countries adopt them?

The OECD hosted a seminar, open to the media, on Monday 2 July to discuss these issues. The heads of the pension protection funds of Germany, Japan, Sweden, Switzerland, the USA and the UK came together for the first time to debate the role that these schemes can play in protecting our retirement income, how they can operate on an economically efficient basis and how they can protect themselves from moral hazard and excessive claims.

The seminar agenda is available for your perusal.

You will also find copies of the presentations delivered on the discussion topics below.

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Summary record: selected highlights

Overview

- Mr Lawrence Churchill, The Pension Protection Fund

Independence

Political intervention - lessons learnt

- Mr Vincent Snowbarger, Interim Director, PBGC, USA

How protection schemes interact with regulation and regulators

- Mr John Ashcroft and Mr Andrew Young, The Pensions regulator, UK

Premium Setting

Opening remarks

- Mr Vital Stutz, Chairman of the Board, BVG, Switzerland

Setting the risk-based levy