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The study starts with a classification of the enterprises depending on their participation to the Vietnam social security. Among the enterprises that contribute, one striking feature is that on average the share in the wage bill of the contributions paid to the Vietnam social security is much lower than the contribution rate established in the law. Even if the enterprises that do not register their employees are excluded from the calculation, the average ratio is of 7.6 percent while the legal rate was in 2006 equal to 23 percent. The study, consequently, examine this issue before investigating the characteristics of the enterprises that do not register their employees. The paper shows that this low ratio is due to a wide practice by enterprises of paying contributions on lower wages than current wages. The paper investigates, furthermore, who benefit from the practice of avoiding registration and from the practice of under-reporting wages to social security. The results indicate strong evidence that employees in enterprises that are not registered to social security and in enterprises that under report wage receive higher net wages.

Contribution Rates --- Enterprise Development & Reform --- Health Insurance --- Income --- Informal Sector --- Labor Market --- Labor Markets --- Labor Policies --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Minimum Wage --- Pensions & Retirement Systems --- Poverty Assessment --- Poverty Reduction --- Private Sector --- Private Sector Development --- Public Sector --- Retirement --- Retirement Income --- Social Insurance --- Social Protections and Labor --- Social Security System --- Unemployment --- Workers

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This report was prepared at the request of the Philippines Social Security System (SSS) to analyze key challenges and propose reform options to improve the sustainability and expand the coverage of old age income protection for private sector workers. A simulation employing the Pension Reform Options Simulation Toolkit (PROST) found that the SSS scheme will face outflows greater than inflows in about 20 years and depletion of its assets in about 28 years. Fortunately, its medium-term financing issues can be addressed through the gradual introduction of parametric reforms that shield workers and retirees from abrupt changes in contributions and benefits. At the same time, the Philippines faces a challenge to improve the defacto coverage of workers by Social Security, and to increase the income protection coverage of the elderly. Options suggested include SSS measures to leverage its identification system and introduce a special instrument for informal workers. Rather than introducing matching contribution subsidies to expand coverage, it was suggested to broaden the scope of beneficiaries eligible for social pensions. Beyond the scope of the SSS, additional measures were suggested including those to improve the access and efficiency of contributions and payments systems, strengthening mobile-money platforms and efforts to improve access to savings instruments, particularly for small and isolated savers. The report points out that the key means of improving coverage lies beyond the scope of social security or pensions, namely, to improve the quantity and quality of wage-based employment.

Aging Population --- Annuities --- Contribution Rates --- Demographics --- Fertility --- Health --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Income Support For Old Age --- Inequality --- Informal Sector --- Labor Markets --- Life Expectancy --- Life Insurance --- Mortality --- Pension Plans --- Pension Reform --- Pensions & Retirement Systems --- Poverty Reduction --- Retirement --- Social Insurance --- Social Protection and Risk Management --- Social Protections and Labor --- Social Security System

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This policy note examines Thailand's programs for preventing poverty among the elderly, and suggests options for improving the effectiveness of these programs. The number of elderly people in Thailand will increase dramatically over the next 30 years, and the elderly already have a higher poverty rate than the population as a whole. Although Thailand currently has a total of eight pension programs, the majority of the benefits go to those who are not poor. In addition, unlike most countries, Thailand lacks a pension and provident fund supervision agency or a consolidated financial institution regulator, and does not appear to have a well-articulated national pension policy. This has led to the development of two major sets of pension programs, with one group sponsored by the ministry of labor and the social security office, and the other by the ministry of finance and the securities commission. These are also supplemented by an assortment of social assistance and community programs sponsored by the ministry of social development and human security and the ministry of interior. This policy note will examine the above issues in more detail and recommend policy options to simplify and coordinate the various pension and social assistance programs aimed at preventing poverty among the elderly, target more spending at the elderly poor, and assure long-term fiscal sustainability.

Aging Population --- Agricultural Cooperatives --- Annuities --- Benefit Formula --- Civil Society Organizations --- Commercial Banks --- Contribution Rates --- Corruption --- Credibility --- Debt --- Economic Development --- Elderly Persons --- Expenditures --- Fertility --- Financial Crisis --- Fraud --- Gender --- Gross Domestic Product --- Health Insurance --- Household Income --- Income Tax --- Inequality --- Inflation --- Insurance --- Labor Market --- Legal Framework --- Life Expectancy --- Microfinance Institutions --- Mortality --- Pension Plans --- Pensions & Retirement Systems --- Poverty Reduction --- Poverty Strategy, analysis and Monitoring --- Primary Education --- Retirement --- Retirement Income --- Securities --- Social Development --- Social Protection and Risk Management --- Social Protections and Labor --- Social Safety Nets --- Transaction Costs --- Transparency

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Social insurance and other arrangements for funding health-care benefits often establish long-term relationships, effectively providing insurance against lasting changes in an individual's health status, engaging in burden-smoothing over the life cycle, and entailing additional elements of redistribution. International portability regarding this type of cover is, therefore, difficult to establish, but at the same time rather important both for the individuals affected and for the health funds involved in any instance of an international change in work place or residence. In this paper, full portability of health-cost cover is taken to mean that mobile individuals can, at a minimum, find comparable continuation of coverage under a different system and that this does not impose external costs or benefits on other members of the systems in the source and destination countries. Both of these aspects needs to be addressed in a meaningful portability framework for health systems, as lacking or incomplete portability may not only lead to significant losses in coverage for an individual who considers becoming mobile which may impede mobility that is otherwise likely to be beneficial. It may also lead to financial losses, or windfall gains, for sources of health-cost funding which can ultimately lead to a detrimental process of risk segmentation across national health systems. Against this background, even the most advanced sets of existing portability rules, such as those agreed upon multilaterally at the EU-level or laid down in bilateral agreements on social protection, appear to be untargeted, inconsistent and therefore potentially harmful, either for migrants or for health funds operated at both ends of the migration process, and hence for other individuals who are covered there.

Access to Health Services --- Administrative Costs --- Contribution Rates --- Economic Policy --- Economies of Scale --- Employment --- Fraud --- Health Care Costs --- Health Care Reform --- Health Economics & Finance --- Health Insurance --- Health Law --- Health Monitoring & Evaluation --- Health Systems Development & Reform --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Inflation --- Insurance --- Insurance Law --- International Law --- Law and Development --- Legal Framework --- Life Expectancy --- Market Forces --- Medical Ethics --- Medicare --- Migration --- Moral Hazard --- Mortality --- Private Health Insurance --- Private Sector --- Public Health --- Social Insurance --- Sustainability --- Workers

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The penetration level of the insurance and pension sectors in Malawi is low, but it seems adequate as compared with other countries in similar stages of development. Concentration and costs are high, the regulatory framework is outdated or inexistent and supervision is weak. An innovative pilot experience of weather micro-insurance is a good example of private-public partnership to reduce vulnerability and extend benefits, but the coverage is still low. The project faces several challenges, one of them being the need to invest in weather technology. Cost benefit analysis of public projects in this area should take into consideration the possible positive social benefits of income security for vulnerable rural population. The analysis needs to take into account that possibilities to increase micro-insurance penetration may be affected by the level of education of farmers, as well as their specific knowledge of insurance products and their confidence in insurance companies. Life insurance and private pension plans have an acceptable level of development as substitute of the non-existing mandatory pensions for private sector workers, but they need a stronger supervision and regulation to enhance their benefits. Rules should seek to promote portfolio diversification, higher portability of pensions and old age income security through well defined benefit rules.

Access to Information --- Annuities --- Asset Management --- Benefit Formula --- Capacity Building --- Capital Markets --- Civil Service --- Contractual Savings --- Contribution Rates --- Debt --- Expenditures --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Financial and Private Sector Development --- Financial Regulation & Supervision --- Financial Sector --- Financial Services --- Fund Management --- Income Tax --- Inflation --- Insurance --- Insurance & Risk Mitigation --- Legal Framework --- Legal Reform --- Legislation --- Life Insurance --- Microinsurance --- Mutual Funds --- Non Bank Financial Institutions --- Pension Administration --- Pension Plans --- Pensions & Retirement Systems --- Political Economy --- Retirement --- Social Protections and Labor --- Standards and Financial Reporting --- Technical Assistance --- Underwriting