How to model pensions

This guide walks through the Pensions module screen by screen. For the concepts behind it — the Demography → Coverage, Macro → Finance pipeline and how scenarios chain together — see how the model works first.

Country-specific

Every input below is configured per country. Today only Spain ships pension reference data end-to-end — Russia currently has Demography only, so its Pensions tab has nothing to configure yet. See Countries for the current status of each.

1. Pensions / Inputs — the Coverage pass

Pick a pinned Demography scenario as the base (pin one first in Demography/Outputs if you haven’t). Optionally align its population total to your earliest pinned scenario, so several Coverage scenarios built on different demography bases stay comparable.

Set the model horizon, then tune three groups:

• Effective retirement age — optional: ramp the statutory retirement age from a base (default 65) to a target over N years, then plateau. Only affects Contributors (RG/RETA) and Retirement (Jubilación) — the segments actually gated by the statutory age; every other beneficiary type is unaffected. Left unchecked, the model uses a flat, unchanged age of 65.
• Contributors — one block per regime (General/RG, Self-employed/RETA): a participation trend (±X%/yr for N years, then plateau) on top of the loaded reference share.
• Beneficiaries — one block per benefit type (Retirement, Widowhood, Permanent disability, Orphanhood, Favor familiar, Non-contributory/PNC), plus Clases Pasivas (the closed state-employee cohort — see Spain — Pensions), each with the same kind of trend.

Preview any block before adding it, then name the scenario and Add — same “everything editable, preview first” pattern as Demography. The retirement-age block’s own preview shows the age trajectory (year vs. effective age); previewing Contributors/Retirement also overlays how their age-participation curve shifts once the retirement-age ramp is enabled.

2. Pensions / Finance

Pick a pinned Coverage scenario and a pinned Macro scenario as the two bases (see how to model macro assumptions if you haven’t set one up yet). Then set:

• Revenue — contribution rate (PAYG % + reserve %) and average annual income by sex, one block per regime.
• Expenditure — average monthly benefit amount by sex, one block per benefit type (+ Clases Pasivas).
• Reserve drawdown — from a chosen year, withdraw a flat %GDP/yr from the accumulated intergenerational reserve to help cover the deficit (capped so the balance never goes negative).
• Discount rate override — optional; leave blank to use the picked Macro scenario’s own GDP growth for the Present Value calculation.

Name the scenario and Add — the resulting Finance scenario embeds a full snapshot of the Coverage and Macro assumptions it was built from, so it stays meaningful even if you later delete or change its parents.

3. Pensions / Outputs

Two kinds of views, picked with the scenario selector at the top:

Coverage scenarios (blue-bordered blocks):

• Age-sex structure — contributors, beneficiaries, or both overlaid (“Combo”), animated or comparing two years.
• Beneficiaries by year — headcount by regime/benefit type over time.

Finance scenarios (green-bordered blocks), each chart with a Bar/Line toggle (top-right, next to CSV export) and a € / %GDP toggle (top-left):

• Deficit / Surplus — revenue, expenditure, and the difference; a checkbox lets you fold the reserve drawdown into revenue to see its effect on the deficit.
• Reserve — the reserve fund’s net balance (contributions minus drawdown) over time.
• Revenue by source / Expenditure by category — the same totals broken down by regime or benefit type.
• Present Value — obligations to current beneficiaries by birth year, with the total shown above the chart (see how the model works for what this means).

Only one Finance scenario shows at a time by default (a radio picker above the charts) — click Compare next to the picker to switch it to checkboxes and overlay several scenarios on the same chart at once, each series labeled with its scenario name. Works on every Finance view above.

Above these, a “Built on” panel (click to expand) shows exactly which Demography assumptions, Macro drivers, and Coverage adjustments the selected Finance scenario traces back to.

4. Save, share, export

Same workflow as every other layer — Add, Save (sign-in), Share, and CSV export all work the same way for Macro, Coverage and Finance scenarios as they do for Demography. See saving and sharing.