China＇s Pension Reform and Capital Market Development

The paper analyzes the interaction between the pension system and capital market development, especially the case of China. A funded pension system is most likely to boost the capital market, but in the absence of a supportive financial infrastructure and effective financial regulation, a funded system will not be successful. China‘s determination to establish a partially funded system is afirst step in the right direction, but without the separation of individual accounts from the social pooling and their replenishment, the working out of the implicit pension debt, and improvements in pension fund management and regulation, the pension system will not be sustainable. The key to capital market development in the process of the pension reform is to enact laws to protect the interests of pensioners, to contract out pension fund management to professional asset managers, and to accelerate the financial opening.