Readiness of Russian students to form individual pension savings

Pension provision issues are among the most urgent problems in both the world and domestic socio-economic policy, as evidenced by frequent changes in pension legislation. Thus, the Russian pension system has undergone serious changes four times over the past two decades, however, by the standards of developed countries, the pension amount continues to be unsatisfactory. In order to attract long-term financial resources to the national economy and improve the quality of life of future pensioners, the authorities are increasingly demonstrating their interest in pushing the population to participation in the system of non-state pension provision. The article presents the results of a sociological study «Savings strategies of Financial University students», which was aimed at identifying the attitudes of Russian students regarding the formation of individual pension savings in non-state pension funds (NPFs). According to the results obtained, students, in general, are already thinking about their future retirement. However, in order to form savings for future old age, students need a sufficient amount of both current income and income in the long term. The most preferred tools for this are foreign currency, securities and cash rubles; the least interest is caused by services of NPFs and insurance companies, which is due to the ideas of insufficient profitability, as well as the riskiness of the activities of these organizations. To attract a youth audience, NPFs need not only to have a reputation as reliable, transparent and customer-oriented organizations, but also to build good communication with potential investors in order to explain the principles and mechanism of their work.