SUSTAINABILITY OF PENSION INSURANCE SYSTEM IN REPUBLIC OF CROATIA

The pension system is very important in the context of social security of every individual or the society in which it is located. Its financing is one of the main factors that determines the standard of living for every pensioner and their financial and social security. Therefore, the level of rights that can be achieved in the pension insurance system directly depends on the capabilities of its funding. Maintaining the stability of the pension system is one of the fundamental problems, both for Croatia and for other EU member states. In the world, the pension systems consist of several subsystems defined with respect to the categories of beneficiaries, method of financing, distribution of pensions etc. Therefore, pension systems can be public or private and mandatory or voluntary. The fundamental division of pension systems is on the public pension system of intergenerational solidarity, which are funded by contributions paid employees and capitalized pension systems that are funded by contributions to the capitalized pension funds. Because each of the models of financing pension insurance has its advantages and disadvantages, today the most used mixed funding models in which instead of one there is a system with multiple pension pillars. Mixed system of financing pensions on the three pillars of insurance was established in Croatia after the pension reform of 2002. But despite the reforms, today's pension insurance system in Croatia has significant problems that complicate the effective functioning. The aim of this paper is to analyse the efficiency and sustainability of the existing pension system in Croatia and the identification of key parameters which determine its further development. The authors with comparative analysis of the pension system in Croatia with the pension system in Slovenia and Switzerland are investigating certain variables important for the sustainability of this insurance in Croatia, and proposals for the upgrade of the existing system and the development of a new financing model to current and future pensioners have better financial and social security. They use a series of scientific research methods (methods of analysis, comparison, induction, deduction, description, classification etc.) as well as certain statistical and mathematical methods used for the analysis and ranking of certain parameters.