Employers' pension provision

This research is based on a survey of pension provision among private sector employers in Britain. A representative sample of 2,401 private sector employers took part in the study. Interviews were conducted in 2005 by telephone, with a response rate of 63 per cent. This is the sixth in a series of similar surveys. Previous surveys were conducted in 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000 and 2003.

The sample for the study was drawn from the Government’s Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR), which is a comprehensive list of employers constructed from VAT and income tax returns. All private sector companies with more than 5,000 employees were contacted for this study (66 per cent of them taking part), as was a representative sample of firms with fewer than 5,000 employees. This enabled us both to cover the larger employers, which account for most private sector employment, and also to generalise to the population of private sector employers as a whole. The survey achieved an overall response rate of 63 per cent. The questionnaire used in 2005 was based upon those used before, making it possible to track trends over time.

Employers' pension provision [ Full report (PDF, 1,270kB) | Research summary (PDF, 112kB) ]