My fund's 2018 report says the allocation is as follows:
- 37,4% stock
- 50,4% fixed (bonds)
- 10% real estate
- etc.. (derivatives, cash)
The past 2 years the news has also been dominated by the law that governs pension funds in my country. Ever since the ECB cut rates pensions have been cut or been close to it. So it seems we don't allow funds to go riskier, as the article describes. In stead the law forces funds to take their losses now, and not postpone them to a next generation.
And during the '08 crisis I remember a talk from a fund manager that said crises don't matter that much for funds. Since they are all focused on the long term the stock will recover anyway and the best thing to do in a crisis is to buy more stock. What funds automatically do since people can't stop contributing.
So the key point in the article seems to be this:
>"There is one other key reason that public pension funds have transitioned into riskier assets. States have passed laws exempting state government pension plans from the standards that private pension plans are held to. These public pension plans are permitted to use generous assumptions about risk that are not permitted in the private sector. So, while public pensions have moved into objectively riskier assets, they haven’t been forced to account for that risk."
So it seems a lack of regulation is the big problem, not economic downturn every now and then.