The Brazilian Association of Pension Funds (ABRAPP) held its international seminar “Pension structures in the Americas,” in Santiago, Chile, on June 7-9 this year.

The seminar addressed different topics, such as the Chilean pension system, trends in pension reforms in the region, risk-based supervision of AFPs in Chile, the structure of investments in the Chilean system, the Multifund system, pension coverage, financial education in Chile, and innovations in pension modalities to address the longevity risk, among others.

On the topic of coverage, FIAP’s Research Manager, Manuel Tabilo, was invited to speak on the existing proposals for increasing contributory pension coverage in the Latin American region.  In his presentation, he proposed 10 alternatives for increasing said coverage:

1. Adopt policies that promote ongoing economic development and productivity
2. Adopt policies that reduce labor informality
3. Educate and communicate the benefits of the contributory pension system
4. Reduce evasion and avoidance of social security contributions
5. Mandatory incorporation of self-employed workers with savings capacity
6. Use income tax collection and returns to add new groups of workers to the contributory pension system
7. Take advantage of possibilities of formalization for paying contributions
8. Maximize incentives for voluntary participation in contributory pension programs
9. Explore the collection of contributions through workers’ consumption
10. Define simple contribution mechanisms using existing technology.