Journal Article

The Influence of Factors in Consumer Sustainable Auto-Enrolment Pensions

Kowalczyk-Rólczyńska, Patrycja, Śledziowski, Jakub, Terefenko, Paweł, Świecka, Beata, Pieńkowska-Kamieniecka, Sylwia

2025

Overview

As pension benefits from statutory public schemes become less generous, and many countries face pension-savings crises, the willingness to participate in supplementary retirement saving instruments becomes crucial for sustainable financial well-being. The main objective of this article is to present how trust and financial literacy influence the choice of sustainable auto-enrolment pension scheme as a private and supplementary pension savings. The study highlighted factors influencing participation in auto-enrollment and private supplementary pension savings. The study focuses mainly on financial literacy and trust. We used the CAWI method with 857 interviews in Poland—the first country in Central and Eastern Europe to introduce an auto-enrolment pension system. Our study uses multivariable data-mining tools, and several regression models were applied. We used Logistic Regression (LR), Multivariate Linear Regression (MLR), and Factor Analysis of Mixed Data (FAMD) to support the LR analysis. We propose four regression models. Our findings present that: 1. The lower the consumer’s knowledge level, the more their decisions are based on trust. 2. Trust in the state, rather than trust in financial institutions, plays a crucial role for people with low financial literacy, which is a critical factor in choosing the auto-enrolment option for pension savings. 3. Men had higher odds of auto-enrolment pension saving than women. 4. Employees of economic universities and academics had higher odds of participating in capital pension plans than those of general universities and non-academics. Our findings can signal to governments and policymakers about factors influencing the choice of auto-enrolment supplementary retirement savings. These findings strengthen the role of sustainable economic education.

• Publisher: MDPI AG
• Subject: Analysis / Colleges & universities / Consumer behavior / Consumers / Decision making / Demographics / Employees / Employers / Financial institutions / Financial literacy / Higher education / Hypotheses / Influence / International finance / Participation / Pension funds / Pension plans / Population / Public opinion / Sociodemographics / Sustainability