Bono por Hijo — Chile's Per-Child Pension Supplement for Women

Chile's privatised, individual-account (AFP) pension system has historically produced markedly lower pensions for women than men, driven by lower and more interrupted contribution histories linked to unpaid child-rearing, an earlier legal retirement age for women, and longer female life expectancy.
The 2008 pension reform (Law 20,255) created the Bono por Hijo: a state-financed supplement paid to women at age 65 for each child born alive or adopted, equal to 10% of 18 times the minimum wage in effect at the child's birth (or in July 2009, whichever applies), plus the average net investment return of pension Fund C accrued from the birth date to the claim date. It is available to AFP-affiliated women and Basic Solidarity Pension recipients who meet residency requirements, independent of whether the child's father ever contributed to the system.
An IMF-cited academic assessment (Economía, LACEA journal) reports the benefit reached 360,000 women beneficiaries in October 2020, raising their average monthly pension by about 9,796 Chilean pesos (roughly US$12.70) — and states this remains insufficient to fully compensate for unpaid caregiving and the resulting employment and pension gap. The same 2008 reform's broader solidarity pillar raised women's expected pension replacement rate by close to 20 percentage points, versus about 15 points for men, reflecting a wider, if still partial, gender-equity design. Official plan rules (Superintendencia de Pensiones) confirm the calculation formula and eligibility criteria.
Honest caveat: despite its wide reach (360,000 women), independent researchers characterise the per-child amount (about US$12.70/month) as too small to meaningfully close the gender pension gap, which remains driven by structural labour-market and unpaid-care inequalities the bonus does not address.

Read the full analysis: https://economia.lse.ac.uk/articles/10.31389/eco.420