A2 Risk Research Shapes New USS Pension Scheme
Assisted by A2Risk, USS has published the results of the largest ever survey of pension scheme members’ attitude to risk, and has revealed how its research has helped to develop the new USS Investment Builder due to launch this autumn.
Professor David Blake, Director of A2Risk and Pension Institute at Cass Business School, said:
“The USS survey of members is the largest ever conducted in the UK for exploring pension scheme members’ attitudes to investment risk. The findings support our previous research which suggests that members’ decisions about their retirement savings are often based more on perception of the investment world and themselves rather than on reality. The survey data have provided USS with a rich source of information from which they can draw upon to understand their members’ attitudes to investment risk and develop their USS Investment Builder proposition specifically for the benefit of the academic sector as part of the new hybrid scheme.”
The USS Investment Builder will be available to all 150, 000 active members of the scheme, and any one joining the scheme in future; membership of this new section will be automatic in respect of salary above £55,000 but will be available to all members if they wish to make additional contributions. Each of the scheme’s 370 participating employers has pledged to match the first 1% of any additional contributions made.