This document provides a world comparative analysis regarding the design and reform of pension systems in order to improve coverage, equality and sustainability. It looks at how pension systems, rules and financing affect coverage, sufficiency, and distribution as well as fiscal and intergenerational sustainability and equality.
Summary .-- Introduction .-- I. Social security and pension systems as social engineering: historical origins and development .-- II. The wide variety of pension systems today: a typology and its distributional implications .-- III. Demographic stages, economic development, social protection and pension systems: searching for connections and models .-- IV. National Transfer Accounts and old-age support income and pension systems: drawing conceptual and analytical links .-- V. A comparative outlook of pension systems models and challenges .-- VI. Recent trends in pension system reform .-- VII. Challenges and options for developing countries.