Carlos Vidal Melia

Carlos Vidal Melia is a Full Professor (Catedrático de Universidad) at the Universitat de València, affiliated with the Faculty of Economics and the Department of Financial Economics and Accounting. He is a member of the WIP (Welfare, Insurance and Pensions) research group, focusing on actuarial and financial aspects of pension systems, long-term care, and social insurance.

His research interests lie at the intersection of financial economics, actuarial science, and public policy. He specializes in the analysis of pension systems, particularly notional defined contribution (NDC) schemes, actuarial balance sheets, longevity risk, and inequalities in life expectancy by income and gender. His work often involves comparative international studies, with a strong focus on the Spanish pension system.

The analysis of his recent publications reveals a consistent and high-impact research trajectory centered on improving the transparency, equity, and solvency of pay-as-you-go pension systems. Key themes include the transformation of government reporting (e.g., Table 29) into full actuarial balance sheets, the impact of pension income on longevity, the design of life care annuities, and the demographic coherence of biometric data for insurance pricing. His work combines rigorous actuarial modeling with policy-relevant insights.

Carlos Vidal Melia has made significant contributions to the academic and policy discourse on pension reform. His research has provided critical evaluations of the 2011 Spanish pension reform and proposed innovative models for integrating disability and long-term care benefits into NDC frameworks. He has also contributed to methodological advances in sampling and statistical testing.

He earned his PhD from the Universitat de València in 1994 with a thesis on individual pension savings plans, supervised by Dr. María Paz Jordá Durá. His doctoral training laid the foundation for his lifelong research on pension systems and financial decision-making in retirement.

His work is conducted within the WIP research group, which fosters interdisciplinary collaboration on welfare, insurance, and pension systems. This group provides a platform for engaging with national and international policymakers, actuaries, and academics.