ESA 2010: Recording of pension
schemes in national accounts
7th Meeting of the Advisory Expert Group
on National Accounts
New York, 23-25 April 2012
Jens Gruetz
OUTLINE
1. BACKGROUND
2. STATE OF PLAY IN EUROPE
3. COMPILATION OF DATA ON PENSIONS:
1. Approach and
2. Assumptions
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1 Background: Supplementary table on pensions
 Funded vs. unfunded pension schemes
 Defined contribution vs. defined benefit vs. notional
defined contribution pension schemes
 ABO vs. PBO
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2 State of play – Time schedule
 Task Force on pensions until 2008
– Final report to CMFB
 Contact group on pensions from 2009
 Pension seminars in 2010 and 2011
 Joint ECB/Eurostat-Pension compilation guide 2012
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2 State of play – Time schedule
 On going discussions on practicalities of the supplementary
table on European level
 ONS: Pension conference London 2012
 Country visits in the course of 2012/2013
– Best practice: Gathering further country specific
experience
 Pension workshop and ESA 2010 training in first half 2013
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3 COMPILATION – THE NEEDS
Measuring unfunded public defined benefit pension
entitlements
Actuarial Model
A) Calculation procedure
B) Key assumptions
C) Data requirements
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3 COMPILATION – THE KEY ASSUMPTION
The discount rate – the single most important
assumption
 One additional percentage point
lowers the pension entitlements by about 20%
How to ensure comparability between different countries?
Long-term Government bonds?
Corporate bonds?
A stable rate over time?
An average?
…
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THANK YOU FOR YOUR KIND ATTENTION!
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