Article Private Pension Systems Built on Precarious Foundations: A Cohort Study of Labor-Force Trajectories in Chile Ignacio Madero-Cabib 1,2 , Andres Biehl 1,2 , Kirsten Sehnbruch 3 , Esteban Calvo 4,5,6,7 and Fabio Bertranou 8 Abstract The success of private pension systems to provide old-age security is mainly a function of continuous individual pension contributions linked to formal employment. Using a rich longitudinal dataset from Chile and employing sequence analysis, this study examines the pension contribution histories and formal employment pathways of a cohort of individuals who began their working lives simultaneously to the introduction of the Chilean private 1 Instituto de Sociologı ´a & Departamento de Salud Pu ´blica, Pontificia Universidad Cato ´lica de Chile, Santiago, Chile 2 Millennium Nucleus for the Study of the Life Course and Vulnerability (MLIV), Santiago, Chile 3 International Inequalities Institute, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, United Kingdom 4 Department of Epidemiology, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA 5 Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA 6 Society and Health Research Center, Facultad de Humanidades, Universidad Mayor, Santiago, Chile 7 Laboratory on Aging and Social Epidemiology, Universidad Mayor, Santiago, Chile 8 International Labour Organization, Santiago, Chile Corresponding Author: Andres Biehl, Avenida Vicun ˜a Mackenna 4860, Casilla 306, Correo 22, Macul, Santiago, Chile. Email: atbiehl@uc.cl Research on Aging 2019, Vol. 41(10) 961–987 ª The Author(s) 2019 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0164027519874687 journals.sagepub.com/home/roa