Not any more... "The percentage of workers in the private sector whose only retirement account is a defined benefit pension plan is now 4%, down from 60% in the early 1980s. About 14% of companies offer a combination of both types." [1]
I mean that in common vernacular, when someone says "pension", they are referring to a defined benefit pension. Otherwise, in the US, we use 401k, IRA, "retirement funds", or other words.
I'm not sure what you're claiming. It's possible to design a very lucrative and costly defined benefit pension, but in the US, no employer is offering it other than governments, and even the governments are beginning to croak under the stress of unsustainable benefits, so new employees are not eligible for them.
Based on some quick Googling, I don't see what is so much better about an SIPP or a group personal pension plan? SIPP offers some kind of matching from the government, but it doesn't seem significant.
Main one is Tax relief at your highest rate on income tax you get an extra 20% into your pension - if your a higher rate tax payer you can reclaim the extra tax relief.
For a higher rate taxpayer you put in £60 and get £100 in your pension.
You can also do salary sacrifice and reduce you income tax and NI lability
I don't know anything about the 401k system, but the money going into my pension is from my gross salary. Combined with high taxation, it means that it's worth up to twice as much going into my pension as it would be going into my bank account.
All that tells me is that there are no more pensions, not that the definition has changed. Employers are contributing money now, but have pushed any risk onto the employee, making it feel pretty worthless as a retirement strategy.
> Employers are contributing money now, but have pushed any risk onto the employee, making it feel pretty worthless as a retirement strategy.
You seem to be arguing that saving for retirement is futile. You can invest is (almost) arbitrarily low risk to principal investments like US treasuries. I probably wouldn't advise that as the sole investment strategy for most people. But it is one way to reduce certain types of risk. (And most defined benefit plans have the same risk with respect to inflation.)
I think they use the word "pension" for defined contribution retirement plans in the UK since they, of course, don't have the US tax code section 401k.