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We examine the labour supply response of senior doctors in England following a reform of the public sector pension system that moved employees from a final salary to a career average pension plan. Exploiting the staggered rollout of the reform across narrowly defined age groups, we find that doctors increased labour supply by just under 4% four years after exposure. This implies a labour supply elasticity with respect to pension wealth of -0.05, and with respect to current returns to work of 0.04. This indicates doctors’ responses were small despite relatively large changes in financial wealth induced by the reforms.
Authors

Research Fellow Imperial College London
Carol is a Research Fellow at the IFS and a Professor of Economics in the Department of Management and Imperial College Business School, London.


Research Economist
Max joined the IFS in 2020 as a research economist in the Healthcare Sector, with a focus on the NHS labour force and adult social care in England.
Working Paper details
- DOI
- 10.1920/wp.ifs.2023.2623
- Publisher
- Institute for Fiscal Studies
Suggested citation
C, Propper and G, Stoye and M, Warner. (2023). The effects of pension reforms on physician labour supply: Evidence from the English NHS. 23/26. London: Institute for Fiscal Studies. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/effects-pension-reforms-physician-labour-supply-evidence-english-nhs (accessed: 10 February 2025).
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