Between labour market and retirement pension — flexible transition as a new paradigm for ageing societies?

Increasing the pensionable age due to rising life expectancy meets strong political resistance. For health and labour market reasons it will always be impossible for some to achieve full pension eligibility directly from employment. Even if early retirement options are not restricted the scope for an accumulation of earnings to fund an early pension is often narrowly defined. Consequently, it is impossible for early retirees to compensate for the reductions in the pension they receive. Contrary to the general tendency to increase the pensionable age an alternative reform proposal is currently under discussion in German social policy circles. This involves free choice of retirement at age 60; unlimited accumulation of additional pension entitlements whilst earning; actuarial deductions for early retirement; and consideration of life expectancy in making adjustments to pension awards. This solution relieves the public pension system financially, raises the attractiveness of senior citizens on the labour market, offers the opportunity for a self‐determined transition from work to retirement and reduces political resistance to pension reform. The effect on the labour market for senior citizens remains to be examined.     

Alienation in a four factor world

This paper aims to reconstruct the concept of alienation as a live topic for active social theorizing. Joining Marxian and Simmelian ideas, it provides a multi‐dimensional, formal, and synthetic theory of alienation. The paper develops a set of theoretical tools for articulating formal elements of action that make alienation possible, without giving conceptual priority to alienation in the sphere of production, or within that sphere to the alienation of labor. These tools make it possible to derive classical notions of alienation as specific, contingent combinations of multiple elements, theorizing them as concrete socio‐historical configurations of a broader universe of possibilities. They also organize systematic reflection on various forms and relations of alienation; not only those between for instance labor and capital, but also among all four factors of production: land, labor, capital, and entrepreneurship. The paper accordingly develops an original, multi‐dimensional theorization of alienation for a complex, pluralistic world.     

A macro‐financial analysis of pension system reforms in emerging Europe: The performance of IRAs and policy lessons for Serbia

The article explores the initial macro‐financial performance of partial pension system “privatizations”— involving privately‐managed individual retirement savings accounts (IRAs) — undertaken in many emerging European countries. Using empirical data for a period of close to a decade, the evidence shows that returns on privately‐managed IRAs have been below the implicit rate of return of public pay‐as‐you‐go (PAYG) systems. High operating costs and undeveloped capital markets are identified as major contributing factors to the failure of privately‐managed IRAs to meet reform expectations. In light of empirical evidence, Serbia is advised to focus on parametric PAYG reforms and to avoid reforms that involve the partial “privatization” of the pension system.     

The development of some characteristics for equitable national retirement income systems

The objective of this paper is to establish and apply a set of characteristics or benchmarks for a nation's total retirement income system to be considered equitable. It must be stressed that the suggested characteristics do not, by themselves, design a national retirement income system. Indeed, it is recognized that the political, historical, economic and cultural context of each country will always influence such designs. However, this paper will demonstrate that different designs of national retirement income systems are not equally effective when subjected to these equity criteria. Hence, in putting forward these characteristics, the aim is to develop clear distinctions between equitable and inequitable national retirement income systems.     

Current and Future Problems of Capital Accumulation in the Chinese Pension System

The decree establishing a uniform system of basic pensions for employees in municipal and private enterprises, published by the State Council on 16 July 1997, reflects the Chinese Government's ultimate choice in favour of a partly private funded scheme to cover future pension needs. This article examines the reasons which led to this choice and asks how easy or otherwise it will be to find the capital to finance it. The authors believe that the partly private scheme is more advantageous than other methods and is right for China. Many issues, however, remain the focus of lively debate. In particular, a realistic coordination of individual and group accumulation is needed in order to avoid shortfalls in capital formation and the dangers of inadequate benefit provision. To safeguard the subsistence needs of former workers in state-owned enterprises, a system of equalization at national level is needed, and problems continue over how future pension insurance funds should best be managed.     

城市低保制度与贫困者的“福利依赖”

本文回顾了福利依赖的研究背景,在此基础上对“福利依赖”的概念进行了澄清,指出福利依赖是“状态”、“行为”、“意向”三位一体的整体,不能片面地理解。进而文章分析了福利依赖产生的两个主要条件：福利替代率与制度惰性。因此可以从以下措施预防和防止福利依赖：预防过高“福利替代率”产生的福利依赖效应;试点针对城市贫困群体的“资产建设”;适当借鉴农村反贫困中的扶贫经验。     

Social protection for the family in the Maghreb

This article is based on a study of the protection afforded to the family under the social insurance schemes of the five Member States of the Arab Maghreb Union, and considers the usefulness of family benefits in economically poor countries gripped by the great problems of population growth and unemployment. This type of social protection is conditional upon the individual being actively employed and covers only a very small part of the working population, leaving out the majority. Should not priority be given to coverage against real occupational risks that threaten employment? This is not an easy question to answer in an increasingly unfavourable economic climate, but it should be possible, in the name of those social and human ethics founded on Maghrebi sentiments of family, local, national and regional solidarity, to mobilize particularly the political will to find better solutions or alternatives. It will, however, be necessary first to reconsider family benefit systems in relation to other, more urgent forms of protection in accordance with a social choice based on the rights and cultural values of Maghrebi citizens. By showing the common features of the Maghrebi schemes at the same time as some of their differences, the article will also present useful elements for their harmonization and even their unification into a regional social security system.     

Retirement timing in Europe: The influence of individual work and life factors

This study considers the rational choice and life course theories to predict European retirement timing. It is relevant to compare men's and women's retirement decisions to determine whether they are influenced by work or by the interplay between work and familial, educational, and leisure life. An event history analysis of the European Community Household Panel (ECHP) suggests that work factors have a greater impact on European women's retirement timing than they do for men and that both men's and women's retirement timing is influenced by the interplay of work and life.     

经济增长:内生增长理论与中国人力资本投资

内生增长理论是现代经济增长理论中的一个核心内容.从长期经济增长率所依赖的路径来看,人力资本和技术进步作为经济增长的内生因素,可以弥补因其他要素收益递减而带来经济增长停滞这一局面.技术进步是由人力资本投资所形成的有效机制而演化成增长动力的一种必然结果.中国技术进步贡献度低下的最主要原因,是由于人力资本投入不足(人力资本积累不足)造成的.在国家财政政策干预下,以内生增长为动力,逐步形成有利于经济增长的物质资本投资向人力资本投资转换的机制.     

人口老龄化与养老保障政策应对研究——基于多元社会政策建构视野

人口老龄化趋势是我国人口结构转变的一个突出现象。人口老龄化问题的突现,势必对养老保障压力提出了新的挑战,同时也会影响国家对养老政策的调整。本文基于＂人口年龄结构—国民经济因素—社会因素—养老政策＂综合分析模型,提出了养老保障政策分析的框架。本文以人口结构转变为切入点,描述了人口老龄化趋势,以及由此引发的国家系统养老保障以及公民社会养老保障挑战。为应对这些挑战,本文基于综合分析模型和现代国家治理结构特点,提出了相应的应对策略。本文认为,只有整体性福利制度构建,才能确保在国民经济发展、人口老龄化趋势与社会稳定之间取得动态平衡。     

Status quo bias in decision making

Most real decisions, unlike those of economics texts, have a status quo alternative—that is, doing nothing or maintaining one's current or previous decision. A series of decision-making experiments shows that individuals disproportionately stick with the status quo. Data on the selections of health plans and retirement programs by faculty members reveal that the status quo bias is substantial in important real decisions. Economics, psychology, and decision theory provide possible explanations for this bias. Applications are discussed ranging from marketing techniques, to industrial organization, to the advance of science.     

Complementary retirement pensions: Towards a definition of terms

One of the main difficulties in carrying out an international comparison of retirement systems is the task of establishing clear common terminology. Like other social institutions, welfare systems differ from country to country; confusion can arise when a given word is applied to different institutional structures because such usage can mask important differences. On the basis of a comparison of complementary pension plans in the United States, Ireland, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, this paper discusses and clarifies the meanings of some key terms. The distinction between "private" and "public" retirement plans, commonly used by Americans, can be erroneously applied to other systems, particularly that of France, where complementary retirement plans resemble American "private" plans in some respects and "public" plans in others. The terms "occupational" and "supplementary", often used in Europe, can be used interchangeably; however, each one stresses different aspects of complementary plans. The terms "funding" and "pay-as-you-go" and their equivalents in French (répartition and capitalisation) have somewhat different meanings and quite different connotations. Finally, the author discusses the concept of "social insurance", as applied to both social security and complementary pension plans, to end with some reflections on the definition of what constitutes a retirement plan.     

College Attendance and Choice of College Majors Among Asian‐American Students*

Objective. This study explores how various measures, ranging from assimilation, to human capital, to family capital, and Holland's career‐development theories, affect Asian‐American students' choice of college majors. To test our hypotheses, we examine choice of college major using a unique measure based on the early earning potential of a large number of specific majors. Methods. Our data come from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS88). We use the Heckman selection approach to adjust for the nonrandom selection of college attendance and choice of college majors. Results. The findings of the study show little difference between Asian men and white men. On the other hand, there are significant differences among women. Conclusions. Chinese, Filipino, and Southeast Asian women are all more likely to choose more lucrative college majors than white women, controlling for all the other factors. Interestingly, effects of our assimilation, psychological, and some of the family capital measures are quite different for men than for women.     

Australia's retirement income revolution: a Finnish system "down-under"

Most advanced industrial societies are confronting serious economic recession, and governments are seeking ways to stimulate economic growth and reduce government expenditure. For many countries these problems are compounded by aging populations and demographic changes. There are fewer people in the workforce, and more people in older age groups live longer and have increased expectations for retirement lifestyles. The result has been that many governments are radically transforming their systems of retirement income provision, often causing political, economic and social upheaval and widespread public anxiety. Australia is one country in which there have been huge changes in the retirement income system in the past 5 years. The system has been substantially privatized, and future retirement income will come from statutorily enforced earnings-related individual savings accumulated in decentralized private funds. Australia's new retirement income regime bears extraordinary similarities to the Finnish system of employment-related pensions, yet there was no reference to the Finnish system in the evolution of the new Australian system. There are lessons for Australia and for other countries in the long and successful operation of the Finnish pension system. This article first examines Australia's retirement income system, recent government policy changes and likely implications of these retirement policy changes for the future of Australia's traditional welfare state. Cross-national comparisons of the retirement income regimes in Finland and Australia, identifying international best practice in each country, comprise the second half of the article. Such comparisons will be of interest to policy-makers seeking new policy directions.     

Designing a social security pension system

Abstract   This paper looks at potential models of social security pension systems. It refers often to the systems that exist in the United States and Canada (the latter more particularly) to outline the issues involved in attempting to design a "good" social security pension system. Of course, one of the issues is the definition of "good". This paper will use criteria such as poverty alleviation, retirement income adequacy, benefit/contribution sustainability, income equality and wealth distribution. In the course of the discussion, the reader will be exposed to many issues that need to be addressed in the establishment of any social security pension system in the world. This may prove to be helpful in countries where new systems are established (and even for evolving systems). It is also hoped that future students of social security will find this paper helpful in that it is meant to lay out some basic principles consistent with good social security pension design.     

Back at the Crossroads: The Slippery Fish of Australian Retirement Income Policy

Australia's retirement income arrangements had reached a policy crossroad by the early 1980s. Not unlike the proverbial slippery fish, the goals and roles of its constituent elements were very difficult to grasp. The ensuing reforms of the 1980s and 1990s brought increasing coherence to these arrangements. Some of the more recent changes, however, have once again introduced policy slipperiness through creating a system that is at odds with the intent of the earlier reform efforts. Indeed, Australia's retirement income arrangements have morphed into a system whose function is no longer simply to protect workers from the loss of earned income arising from retirement. The ‘zenith’ of this situation was reached in July 2007 when the major changes in superannuation announced in the 2006 federal budget took effect. Thus, Australia is once again back at a policy crossroad as far as her retirement income arrangements are concerned.     

Reforming pensions: Principles, analytical errors and policy directions

This article, sets out a series of principles for pension design rooted in economic theory: pension systems have multiple objectives, analysis should consider the pension system as a whole, analysis should be framed in a second-best context, different systems share risks differently, and systems have different effects by generation and by gender. That discussion is reinforced by identification of a series of widespread analytical errors — errors that appear in World Bank work, but by no means only in World Bank work: tunnel vision, improper use of first-best analysis, improper use of steady-state analysis, incomplete analysis of implicit pension debt, incomplete analysis of the impact of funding (including excessive focus on financial flows, failure to consider how funding is generated, and improper focus on the type of asset in trust funds), and ignoring distributional effects. The second part of the article considers implications for policy: there is no single best pension design, earlier retirement does little or nothing to reduce unemployment, unsustainable pension promises need to be addressed directly, a move from pay-as-you-go towards funding in a mandatory system may or may not be welfare improving, and implementation matters — policy design that exceeds a country's capacity to implement it is bad policy design. We illustrate the ranges of designs of pension systems that fit the fiscal and institutional capacity constraints typical at different levels of economic development. The potential gains from simplicity imply that a country capable of implementing an administratively demanding plan does not necessarily gain from doing so. New Zealand has a simple pension system through choice, not constraint.     

The effect of immigration in the retirement age reforms: learning from a numerical example

This article examines the role played by the low-skilled immigrant labour force in countries aiming to reform their public pension systems by postponing the pensionable age. With an overlapping-generations model in continuous time and a fully redistributive pension system, the results of this article suggest that immigration could imply a delay in the pensionable retirement age. Further, we find that the preference for a delay in retirement age increases with the labour productivity of both immigrants and native population.     

On welfare effects of increasing retirement age

We develop an OLG model with realistic assumptions about longevity to analyze the welfare effects of raising the retirement age. We look at a scenario where an economy has a pay-as-you-go defined benefit scheme and compare it to a scenario with defined contribution schemes (funded or notional). We show that, initially, in both types of pension system schemes the majority of welfare effects comes from adjustments in taxes and/or prices. After the transition period, welfare effects are predominantly generated by the preference for smoothing inherent in many widely used models. We also show that although incentives differ between defined benefit and defined contribution systems, the welfare effects are of comparable magnitude under both schemes. We provide an explanation for this counter-intuitive result.