WHAT ARE OCCUPATIONAL PENSION PLAN ENTITLEMENTS WORTH IN BRITAIN

The acquisition of rights by workers in private pension plans underpin s retirement behaviour, recruitment policy and wage structure, but the re is controversy as to how these individual pension rights should be valued. The paper combines four data-sets to calculate pension entitle ments for a sample of 3000 British workers in 1987. Expected scheme te nure is a key variable in valuation; younger workers and women face gr eater initial uncertainty as to their pension outcomes, which is resol ved as job tenure lengthens. Given the distribution of tenure duration s, many employees would obtain higher returns in defined contribution schemes than in a typical final-salary-defined benefit plan.