Pensions for postdocs

Postdocs funded by the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) will soon have a better way to save for retirement. The organization this month announced the creation of an internationally portable pension plan for the 400 or so recipients of linkurl:EMBO postdoc fellowships.;http://www.embo.org/news/embo-pioneers-pension-plan-for-internationally-mobile-post-doctoral-researchers.html

Image: Wikimedia Commons

In most European countries, scientists can pay part of their salaries into a country-run pension program. However, for Jan Taplick, who started his scientific training in Germany but traveled to Vienna for his PhD and Israel for his postdoc, the inability to transfer retirement savings from one government plan to another made saving impractical. By the time they settle into permanent employment in one country, scientists may be "35 or 40 [years old] before they start paying into a state system," which is a late start for retirement savings, said Taplick. Taplick, now the EMBO fellowships program manager, and others decided to try to offer...