Senior Economist

at  Pensions Regulator

ABOUT US

More than half the UK working population rely on The Pensions Regulator to regulate their retirement savings. With a career at TPR, you’ll be joining an organisation that will impact on millions of lives for decades to come.
Everyone at TPR plays an important role in helping to keep more than £2trn of savings safe. We’re committed to bringing people into TPR who are ready to make a difference and put UK savers at the heart of what we do.
It is important to us that TPR remains a great place to work. We do all we can to help our people reach their full potential with learning, secondment, and development opportunities. We put our 900+ employees first, supporting flexible working and offer a diverse, lively, and inclusive environment. This includes our Disability Network, Family Network, LGBT+ Network (Proud), Ethnic (ME) Network and Women’s Network, which offer spaces to connect.
Our new corporate strategy outlines a bold and challenging vision of how pensions regulation should evolve to keep pace with a change in the scale and nature of the industry. We are at the start of that journey. Join us to find out what part you can play.
We operate a hybrid working model, with regular attendance in our Brighton office to connect with colleagues across the business.

NATIONALITY REQUIREMENTS

Open to UK nationals only.

ROLE

This is an exciting new role to TPR and will have a broad remit to support us in evolving our market oversight. You will be a crucial member of multi-disciplinary teams focusing on three main areas:

• Financial stability – ensure TPR will be able to prevent the build-up of financial stability risks generated by trust-based pension schemes and mitigate them
• Market structure – ensure the competitiveness of pension provision as the market rapidly consolidates
• Policy initiatives – ensure that the introduction of policy changes and new pension products are grounded in good economic theory and balance the benefits for the saver with the wider UK economy.

The main focus of the role, at least initially, will be informing our work on financial stability as we look to further enhance our capability in this area in response to recommendations made by the Financial Policy Committee of the Bank of England.
We are looking for the right candidate to join the Regulatory Policy Analysis and Advice Directorate working closely with investment consultants, actuaries, covenant and financial analysts and policy advisors some of whom have strong economic backgrounds. More broadly within TPR you will liaise with strategy and risk colleagues to horizon scan developing needs and priorities within our corporate plan and providing high quality advice to the Board and Executive Committee. You will need to be comfortable representing TPR externally and liaising with senior regulatory and policy colleagues at the Bank of England, Prudential Regulation Authority, Financial Conduct Authority, Department for Work and Pensions and HM Treasury.
You will be highly personally motivated, helping to shape this role as TPR develops a more effective market oversight function. You will need to be content working in a matrix management set-up involving multi-disciplinary teams. Technical skills are important although there is strong modelling support.

RESPONSIBILITIES

You will:

Financial Stability

• Lead on horizon scanning for risks inherent within pension schemes that could have a system wide financial impact and necessitate government intervention. Your role will be to co-ordinate work within TPR on identifying these risks, collaborating with other regulators, and leading a programme of work to mitigate them.
• Lead on contingency planning for the crystallisation of highlighted risks to ensure TPR is ready to respond to a market dysfunction – including liaising with the Bank of England to assist with the development of a new lending tool that could be made available to eligible pensions schemes.
• Be part of the team that monitors LDI resilience and market volatility in general and assesses how pensions schemes interact with other financial institutions when put under stress.
• Coordinate (with other regulators as appropriate) outreach with key asset managers and investment advisory firms to gather information on market risk and trends.

Economic Advice

• Lead on assessing the evolution of the pensions’ market as it consolidates to ensure value for money is achieved for savers. This will involve advising on:
• competitive market structure;
• the impact of market innovations;
• the impact of market capability and capacity constraints on the speed of efficient change;
• the balance of incentives between corporate risk, productive finance and saver protection.
• providing an economic framework to better assess the optimal balance over time of Defined Contribution, Collective Defined Contribution and Defined Benefit, and where we can nudge the market to change.
• Lead on assessing the financial stability and economic impact of any new policy initiatives and interventions.
• Develop economic framework to assess policy options.
• Stay ahead of market developments and academic research, and share your economic knowledge more widely within TPR, providing training as appropriate.
• Undertake thought leadership and commission research within TPR or in partnership with regulatory partners.

To apply please email recruitmentteam@tpr.gov.uk quoting role reference number 183276 along with:

• a covering letter with details of how your skills and experience meet the role requirements
• a copy of your CV
• details of your notice perio