ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the process of reframing pension policy in three small countries: the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden. The pension systems in these countries had broadly similar starting points, which we call common origins. However, pension policies in all three countries evolved in strikingly different directions. Yet despite their common origins and divergent pathways, each pension system nevertheless managed to produce surprisingly similar policy outcomes as measured by poverty and inequality levels. These conclusions appear to run counter to conventional assumptions on which the comparative study of pension policy rests (see also Anderson 2004).
