The rate of self-employment in the UK is among the highest in Europe. It is just below the rate in Australia, but significantly higher than the US. In Spring 2003 there were 3.2m self-employed people in the United Kingdom. 

This Briefing Note looks at the self-employed population and explores what pension provision or other savings they have. It finds that there is no evidence that self-employed people have lower total incomes in retirement. Earnings play a more prominent role in retirement income for the self-employed, however it is not clear if this is because self-employed people want to continue working, or because they need to for financial reasons.

To download Briefing Note 8, please click here. 

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