German Federal Pension Insurance

The mandatory state insurance in Germany began in 1889 with the "Law regarding infirmity and old age insurance" (Gesetz betreffend die Invaliditäts- und Altersversicherung). Precursor organisations of the Deutsche Rentenversicherung and their respective responsibilities included the following:

Federal Insurance Institute for Employees (BfA, Bundesversicherungsanstalt für Angestellte): insurance of employees

22 state-level insurance institutes (LVA, Landesversicherungsanstalt): insurance of labourers and artisans

Federal Miners' Association (Bundesknappschaft): insurance of workers in the mining sectors

Sea Insurance (Seekasse): insurance of seamen

Train Insurance Institute (Bahnversicherungsanstalt): insurance of train and railway workers

Beyond these, while formally the responsibility of the BfA, independent artists and publishers had their pension insurances managed by the Artists' Social Insurance (Künstlersozialkasse) as a special department of the Federal Accident Insurance (Unfallkasse des Bundes). Within this system, the Association of Pension Insurance Carriers (VDR, Verband Deutscher Rentenversicherungsträger) acted as overarching association and was responsible, among else, for managing the computing centre of the pension insurance (DSRV, Datenstelle der Rentenversicherung) in Würzburg.

Due to changes in the world of work, the initially small share of insured employees rapidly increased and ultimately exceeded the number of insured categorized as labourers, resulting in large differences between the numbers of insured and pensions of the pension insurance for employees and labourers. To address this discrepancy, the 1992 social insurance reform unified the different regulations concerning employees, labourers and miners and ended the distinction between labourers and employees. In 2005, the BfA and VDR were fused into the DRV Bund and the number of regional insurance institutes reduced, while the Federal Miners' Association, Sea Insurance and Train Insurance Institute were aggregated to the DRV Knappschaft-Bahn-See (DRV KBS). Following these reforms, the objective is for regional carriers to care for 55 % of the insured, the DRV Bund to care for 40 % of the insured and the DRV KBS to be responsible for 5 % of the insured, as a means to distribute the burden of insurance administration among the DRV carriers.