Pension schemes prove shaky pillars for capital markets in CEE

It is easy to see why economists love second-pillar pension schemes. Making workers pay into privately managed funds not only addresses the issue of unfunded state pension liabilities, it also creates a ready-made institutional investor base that can support the development of local capital markets. If only it were that simple.

Unfortunately, an ever-increasing weight of evidence from emerging Europe suggests that, however good the second-pillar idea may be in theory, it is never long before it bumps up against hard political realities. 

Hungary, the first country in the region to opt for the system back in 1998, was also the first to lose it when Viktor Orban’s Fidesz party appropriated the funds to boost the state budget in 2010. No other government has gone quite that far.

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