Designing Retirement-Income-Security Arrangements: Theory, Issues and Applications to Sri Lanka

Rationale

Several issues have arisen in the current international debate with regard to the "reform" of income security arrangements, especially, but not only, because of demographic ageing. These include methods of funding, benefit calculations and management.

Objectives

The study assesses the above mentioned issues in both their practical and theoretical contexts. It also attempts to develop a matrix for categorizing the functional impacts of income-security arrangements, and evaluates different forms of income security design in terms of their functional strengths and weaknesses. The last section derives applications to the income security arrangements in Sri Lanka. It relates the theoretical understanding with historical developments and political realities in identifying specific policy options to improve the adequacy, coverage, efficiency and sustainability of retirement income arrangements in the Sri Lankan context.