Warum fast alle das deutsche Rentensystem ungerecht finden, aber trotzdem nichts daran ändern möchten

As Germany’s representative 2006 Survey of the International Social Justice Project clarifies, intergenerational justice and financing of future pensions are seen as central problems of Germany’s state pension system by a vast majority. Despite this common perception, proposals for reform that address the issue of intergenerational justice directly at the institutional level are extremely unpopular. Moreover, concrete constitutive elements of the state pensions system, like the amount of contributions, the amount of benefits and the principle of status-conservation are seen as largely fair. As mechanisms driving this preference for the status quo, anchoring effects, loss aversion and socialization are proposed and tested empirically via factorial survey methods. Results indicate that arbitrary settings (anchors) determine what people regard as a just pension irrespective of individual justice standards. Furthermore, loss aversion can help explain why individual worries about economic status in old age overlay consideration of exchange relations between the young and the old within the pensions system. As a result, potential benefits of reform are hardly recognized. Finally, former institutional settings prove to be formative for ideas of justice in the long run. Even under the condition of comparable economic interests, Germans from the former GDR expect a more egalitarian distribution of pensions, whereas Western Germans strongly favor allocation according to status criteria.     

Immigrants in the Old‐Age Pension System: The Case of Sweden

The article investigates incomes and especially state pensions 2008 among elderly immigrants who arrived in Sweden before 1970. At age 70 and above, the level of state old‐age pension for immigrant men was nearly the same and for immigrant women somewhat higher than for natives with similar characteristics. At age 65–66 the state pension was lower for immigrants than for their native counterparts. The differences in pensions for immigrants of different ages are probably due to changed rules in the Swedish state old‐age pension system from 2003. The new rules have hit different age groups in different ways. The gaps are partially levelled out when other incomes are included. The extent to which levelling occurs varies greatly between different immigrant groups. For immigrants who have arrived during the last decades, the future state old‐age pension outcomes are expected to be worse.

Policy Implications

• The Swedish Pensions Agency should set up a register of pensions from abroad. This will tell us to what extent old‐age pensions from the home country compensate for low old‐age pensions from the Swedish system.
• Better integration on the labour market is a powerful measure for reducing the risk of future low pensions among immigrants. This is a challenge for Swedish integration policy.
• To what extent can other parts of the Swedish welfare system in the future compensate individuals with low old‐age pensions?

     

Political election on legal retirement age

In the context of the current debate surrounding the reform of pension systems, this paper analyzes the political economy of the legal retirement age. Using a life-cycle model in which individuals differ by age and by wage, we analyze the outcome of a majority voting process on the legal retirement age in a Pay-As-You-Go pension system. The results show that the older an individual is, the closer her optimal retirement age is to the status quo age. That is, the status quo retirement age acts as a magnet. Additionally, we find that the preferred legal retirement age of most of the working population increases when the pension system is more redistributive. We also observe a positive relationship between the preferred legal retirement age and the status quo age.     

Creating Rural Citizens in Guadeloupe in the Early Third French Republic

This article examines the short-lived efforts of the French colonial state to create a class of independent peasant farmers in Guadeloupe at the end of the nineteenth century, a project that reversed earlier post-emancipation legislation. It argues that economic, and especially political, considerations drove the project. By promoting peasant farming, officials attempted to reform life on the colony and stem the spread of socialism without undertaking large-scale social or economic reform. The reform potentially opened up new opportunities for Guadeloupean men of color to be integrated more fully within the French nation as citizens; this inclusion, though, depended on the labour of other political marginalised groups, namely women and immigrant workers.     

Intergenerational Coresidence and Family Transitions in the United States, 1850 - 1880

This study uses a new source of linked census data (N = 6,734) to test theories proposed to explain the high intergenerational coresidence in 19th‐century America. Was it a system of support for dependent elderly, or did it reflect intergenerational interdependence? I focus on transitions from middle age to old age, and I assess key predictors of family transitions, including widowhood, retirement, disability, migration, and wealth. The results show that adverse events precipitated changes in the headship of intergenerational families but did not increase the likelihood of residing in an intergenerational family. The findings suggest that 19th‐century intergenerational coresidence was not principally a means of old‐age support; more often, probably, there was a reciprocal relationship between generations.     

Guilds in the transition to modernity: The cases of Germany,United Kingdom,and the Netherlands

One important aspect of the transition to modernity is the survival of elements of the Old Regime beyond the French Revolution. It has been claimed that this can explain why in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries some Western countries adopted national corporatist structures while others transformed into liberal market economies. One of those elements is the persistence or absence of guild traditions. This is usually analyzed in a national context. This article aims to contribute to the debate by investigating the development of separate trades in Germany, the United Kingdom, and The Netherlands throughout the nineteenth century. We distinguish six scenarios of what might have happened to crafts and investigate how the prevalence of each of these scenarios in the three countries had an impact on the emerging national political economies. By focusing on trades, rather than on the national political economy, our analysis demonstrates that in each country the formation of national political economies and citizenship rights was not the result of a national pattern of guild survival. Rather, the pattern that emerged by the end of the nineteenth century was determined by the balance between old and new industries, and that between national and regional or local government.     

Retirement systems and pension reform: A Malaysian perspective

This paper reviews and assesses emerging issues in retirement systems and pension reform in Malaysia. The pension system models proposed by the ILO, the World Bank and the Geneva Association are compared and analysed, providing a useful conceptual framework for the design and reform of pension systems. This framework is then used to assess pension reforms in Malaysia, analysing the relative advantages and disadvantages for workers. The authors conclude by proposing a number of recommendations for retirement system design and reform.     

Women's Welfare and Social Security Privatization in Mexico

Several Latin American countries have fully or partially privatizedtheir public pensions since the 1980s. In 1995 Mexico privatizedits public pension system, including a shift from a definedbenefit to defined contribution system based on privately administeredindividual accounts. This article uses feminist criteria toevaluate the gender impact of welfare regimes and concludesthat the Mexican pension privatization will have a negativeeffect on women’s welfare in old age.     

The poverty of the Czech elderly--myth or reality?

"Poverty among the Czech elderly is considered from two perspectives: objective and subjective. Various indicators of objective poverty are analysed, such as the relation of average monthly income to average old-age pension, pension inequalities, the structure of household expenditures, and the structure of consumer durables ownership, as are representative survey data measuring subjective poverty. It is concluded that from the objective point of view the Czech elderly are as a whole well above subsistence poverty. However, their subjective poverty seems quite far-reaching, affecting between 30 and 50 percent."     

Amerindian Livelihoods,Outside Interventions,and Poverty Traps in the Ecuadorian Amazon

Recent efforts to explain the persistence of rural poverty have made frequent use of the concept of poverty traps, understood as self‐reinforcing poverty. The dynamic dimension of the poverty trap concept makes it a potentially useful tool for understanding conditions of persistent poverty, especially in circumstances where outside interventions “shock” the system with the intention of ending poverty and disadvantage. This article describes one such effort among a populous group of lowland Amerindians, the Shuar of Ecuador's Amazon region. Three small household surveys conducted at different times during the last 25 years suggest that the Shuar, despite having obtained access to land through a combination of their own efforts and outside interventions, have become enmeshed in a natural‐resource‐degrading poverty trap. Mestizos with land in the same region avoided this trap only by emigrating in large numbers. Secure access to land did not prevent the emergence of a poverty trap among the Shuar in large part because smallholders in Latin America faced difficult macrosociological and ecological conditions during the last decades of the twentieth century.     

Older Women in Poverty: The Impact of Midlife Factors

This study investigates the factors contributing to older women's economic well‐being from a life course perspective, assessing the effects of both midlife characteristics and later life events on women between the ages of 66–70, and 71–85. Using the 1968–1997 Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the findings suggest that midlife characteristics such as workforce participation, income, and rural residence are strongly related to economic outcomes in old age. Late‐life events and characteristics, however, also contribute significantly to economic outcomes even when midlife factors are incorporated into analyses. In addition, both midlife and later life characteristics contribute to the persistence of poverty in old age, with many groups of ever poor women finding themselves in poverty for over 50% of their old age years.     

Reforming Land‐Tenure Systems in South Africa: Routes to Socio‐Economic and Agricultural Sustainability

Given the historical development of land tenure in South Africa, the aim of this article is to examine the best routes to alleviate poverty and retain sustainable agriculture in the country. First, a theoretical framework is presented that relates land tenure to sustainability, and three historical periods (pre‐colonial, colonial, and apartheid) are then considered to explain the changes in land tenure and their consequences. The progress and main limitations of post‐apartheid land reform to approach agricultural sustainability and alleviate poverty are discussed. Based on the analysis, different possibilities for future land reform are elaborated, followed by some recommendations for future land‐reform policies in South Africa.     

Zur Entwicklung der privaten Altersvorsorge in Deutschland

Additional private old age provision is gaining in importance given the limited success of recent reforms attempting to solve the demographic problem of statutory pension insurance. Thus, the willingness of Germans to invest in private old age provision is analyzed. Points of interest are the extent of existing private old age provision and the expected security in old age. The study is based on two representative surveys examining the group between 30 and 60 years of age. The analysis shows that every second member of this age group is willing to pay for private old age provision in order to maintain the given level of social security; that two thirds have taken measures for private provision; and that the percentage of those taking such measures is growing. Since many people cannot afford private old age provision the inequality of private provision is growing. Financial aid by the state according to the law on old age property will not change much since, particularly, high income people benefit from the sponsorship system consisting of allowances and tax savings, whereas subsidies for low income groups are too small. The welfare guidelines will have to be fundamentally revised. Only those should be supported who are not in a position to build up an additional old age provision out of their own.     

Pension reforms and old people in Poland: An age,class, and gender lens

Research on the socio-economic transition in and subsequent pension reforms in Eastern and Central Europe tend to view age as a social status, not a power relation. In addition, studies that explore the policy consequences for old people tend to homogenize them or focus on only one form of inequality. However, State actions, articulated in pension reforms, can distribute the economic costs of reforms unevenly across different groups.This paper considers the present and the future ramifications of the Polish pension reforms on the economic well being of diverse groups of old people. Poland provides an especially interesting case because the new system, which will take full effect in 2006, includes mandatory personal accounts. Throughout our analysis, we attend to inequality and the class- and gender-specific implications of the reforms. We argue that age, gender, and class relations underlie social policies related to pensions. Old people are depicted and manipulated by State officials in ways that allow the latter to attain economic stability and legitimate their authority among other constituencies, especially the young. Finally, analysis of the expected outcomes of the Polish new pension system that includes personal accounts provides a reference point against which proposals in other countries, such as the U.S., debating the introduction of similar systems can be assessed. Thus, we conclude by discussing some trends relevant to future Polish retirees and briefly state the implications of our discussion for these debates.     

Can Latin America Protect the Elderly with Non‐Contributory Programmes? The Case of Uruguay

Coverage of contributory pension programmes has been quite disappointing in Latin America in the aftermath of the reforms. The question thus arises as to whether non‐contributory programmes could fill the gap. Uruguay is atypical in this region in that the proportion of the elderly receiving contributory pensions is high, and the incidence of poverty among the aged population is lower than among any other age group. But several observers fear that this situation could deteriorate in the future, because the conditions for accessing the pensions have been significantly tightened in the past decade. This article assesses several options for reforming the existing non‐contributory pension programme, and estimates their fiscal cost.     

Gender inequalities in pensions: different components similar levels of dispersion

While the average gender gap in pensions is quite well documented, gender differences in the distribution of pensions have rarely been explored. We show in this paper that pension dispersion is very similar for men and women within the French pension system of a given sector (public or private). Gender differences are less marked among retired civil servants than among former private sector employees. However, the determinants of these inequalities are not the same for men and women. Using a regression-based decomposition of the Gini coefficient, we find that pension dispersion is mostly due to dispersion of the reference wage for all retirees but gender differences exist. For women, in particular, pension dispersion is also due to the dispersion in contribution periods. We also decompose the Gini coefficient by source of pension to measure the impact of institutional rules (minimum pensions, survivor’s pension) on the extent of pension inequality. Unexpectedly, we find that the impact of minimum pensions is limited, although slightly larger for civil servants than for private-sector employees. Survivor’s pension schemes, on the other hand, contribute positively to pension dispersion among retired women.     

Social Change and Social Policy in Japan

This paper aims to present and discuss social change and social policy in Japan after the mid-20th century from a sociological viewpoint. Japanese social change and social policy from the mid-20th century onward can be categorized into three models in chronological order: escape from mass poverty by means of industrialization, improvement of the social security system to establish a welfare state, and parallel progress of aspiration for a welfare society and workfare. Defined concretely, these are (1) the period that established and improved social security, which started immediately after the end of World War II and ended in 1973, when Japan began to suffer from low growth after enjoying high growth; (2) the period in which finance for social security was adjusted, halfway through which the country experienced a bubble economy; and (3) the period after the 1990s, in which the structural reform of social security went hand-in-hand with labor policy and the advent of globalization. In each of the three periods, the direction of social policy was affected by factors that caused changes in such areas as industrial structure (the decline of agriculture), demographic structure (an aging society), and family structure and work pattern (the growing trend of nuclear families, single-person households, and irregular employment). In Japan, life security now attracts increasing attention, and employment security rather than social security has been the central issue. As it is greatly affected by globalization, employment security grows less conspicuous and makes the vulnerability of social security grow more conspicuous. Social policy has the potential to become an area with which to struggle for national integration and fissures between social groups.     

Is Swedish pension reform the right medicine for aging Europe?

Following the Second World War, the idea of the life course with distinct periods of education, work, and retirement became popular as a result of the alliance of interests of unions and management, with politicians seizing the opportunity to accommodate them. These "social partners" implemented benefit rules and created practices for using old age and disability to ease the exit of older workers. Although justifiable at the time, now those rules and practices hinder individual and employer incentives to invest in human capital and work environments that enable older workers to remain in the workforce. The article argues that the workforce environment of the coming half-century, which is relevant for persons born around 2000, is much different from that a hundred years earlier, which determined the opportunities for people born around 1900. People are healthier and live much longer and work environments are friendlier. The article argues that it is no longer justifiable to subsidize exit from the workforce around the age of 60 for healthy workers, especially in view of the coming labor shortage in Europe. It also argues that the introduction of the principles of the Swedish NDC pension reform in Europe would provide possibilities for flexible exit from the workforce and remove impediments to labor mobility in Europe, which are embedded in many of Europe's present pension arrangements.     

Phonological Specificity in 12‐ and 17‐Month‐Old French‐Speaking Infants

The literature reports some contradictory results on the degree of phonological specificity of infants’ early lexical representations in the Romance language, French, and Germanic languages. It is not clear whether these discrepancies are because of differences in method, in language characteristics, or in participants’ age. In this study, we examined whether 12‐ and 17‐month‐old French‐speaking infants are able to distinguish well‐pronounced from mispronounced words (one or two features of their initial consonant). To this end, 46 infants participated in a preferential looking experiment in which they were presented with pairs of pictures together with a spoken word well pronounced or mispronounced. The results show that both 12‐ and 17‐month‐old infants look longer at the pictures corresponding to well‐pronounced words than to mispronounced words, but show no difference between the two mispronunciation types. These results suggest that, as early as 12 months, French‐speaking infants, like those exposed to Germanic languages, already possess detailed phonological representations of familiar words.