Rent-Seeking in Private Pensions (PDF)

This book argues that the implementation of compulsory, highly regulated, privately administered, defined contribution pensions facilitates rent-seeking behaviour on the part of the pension fund administrators and undermines the retirees' income and well-being. While the book focuses primarily on Chile, its analysis and conclusions are applicable to several Latin American and Eastern European countries where privately administered pension systems have been implemented. Chapters evaluate the scholarly literature and empirical evidence around three aspects of the pension fund industry: structure, pricing and performance. The authors conclude that state regulation has facilitated the accumulation of capital in the hands of the pension fund administrators. They also demonstrate that these systems owe more to the values and principles of conservative philosophy than to neoliberalism in providing alternative solutions to the rent-seeking approach to retirement.

Silvia Borzutzky is a Teaching Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, USA. She has written extensively on Chilean politics and social security policies. She is the author of Vital Connections: Politics, Social Security and Inequality in Chile (2002), and co-editor of After Pinochet: The Chilean Road to Capitalism and Democracy (2006), and The Bachelet Government: Conflict and Consensus in Post-Pinochet Chile (2010).