Fairness of Public Pensions and Old-Age Poverty

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may AbstractIn several OECD countries, public pay-as-you-go financed pension systems have undergone major reforms in which future retirement benefit promises have been scaled down.

Health care expenditures and longevity: is there a Eubie Blake effect?

“…These data apply to the German population as a whole and not only to sickness fund members. Since the omitted group, the privately insured, have on average higher incomes, and life expectancy is positively associated with income in Germany [5,33], the population-based life expectancy is somewhat higher than the true life expectancy of sickness fund members, but this error should be rather small given that sickness fund members account for about 90 % of the German population.…”

“…In medical studies, in particular those concerned with specific diseases, this measure is used instead of life expectancy as such. 5 Assessing the impact of life expectancy on total HCE in a country requires the use of population-level data for two reasons: firstly, for individuals, life expectancy is not welldefined let alone observable, while, secondly, the red herring effect even though many authors use individual data to make their point in this debate is focused exactly on the question of whether population ageing due to increasing life expectancies will lead to increasing HCE in a country; whether this is the case not only depends on individual demand but also on supply side factors like government interventions or measures taken by the sickness funds. 6 Hence, population-level data should be used to scrutinize the validity of the red-herring theory.…”

Should Pensions Be Progressive? Yes, at Least in Germany!

“…Therefore, labor supply distortions already tend to be very low in this country. As argued in Breyer and Hupfeld (2009) and Arent and Nagl (2010), Germany expects a significant increase in old-age poverty. Therefore the current reform debate calls for at least some redistribution within the pension system, see Breyer and Hupfeld (2009).…”

Addressing Longevity’ Heterogeneity in Pension Scheme Design

“…Pursuing longer working lives can be justified on the basis of both a macroeconomic setting and an individual welfareenhancing perspective (Breyer & Hupfeld, 2009). With longevity heterogeneity, individuals of different socioeconomic groups retiring at the same age can expect very different lengths of retirement.…”

“…Although a broad range of factors can in principle affect the retirement decision of older workers, 4 four main characteristics of old-age pension schemes are particularly important in this context: the standard and early ages of entitlement to pension benefits; the generosity of pension benefits; the implicit marginal tax attached to continued work; and the earnings-relatedness of a pension scheme.…”