Demographic Shock and Social Security: A Political Economy Perspective

International Tax and Public Finance - Tập 8 - Trang 417-431 - 2001
Georges Casamatta1, Helmuth Cremer2, Pierre Pestieau3
1GREMAQ—CNRS, Université de Toulouse, Cedex, France
2GREMAQ and IDEI, Université de Toulouse and Institut universitaire de France, France
3CREPP, Université de Liège, CORE and Delta, France

Tóm tắt

We assume that individual voters differ not only according to age but also productivity. In the steady state, workers with wages in the intermediate range join the retired persons to form a majority and vote for a positive level of social security. When a shock decreases population growth, entrenched interests can constrain majority voting decisions and prevent reforms in the name of entitlements. We show that from a Rawlsian viewpoint it may be desirable to rely on these entitlements to protect the low wage earners of the transition generations. However, when the possibility of fixing a basic pension is introduced, it constitutes a better instrument than entitlements.

Từ khóa


Tài liệu tham khảo

Boadway, R.W. and D. E. Wildasin. (1989). "A Median Voter Model of Social Security." International Economic Review 30, 307–328.

Boldrin, M. and A. Rustichini. (2000). "Equilibria with Social Security." Review of Economic Dynamics 3, 41–78.

Browning, E. K. (1975). "Why the Social Insurance Budget is Too Large in a Democracy." Economic Enquiry 13, 373–388.

Casamatta, G. (2000). "The Political Power of the Retirees in a Two Dimensional Voting Model."Working Paper, GREMAQ, Universit´e de Toulouse.

Casamatta, G. H. Cremer and P. Pestieau. (2000a). "Political Sustainability and the Design of Social Insurance." Journal of Public Economics 75, 341–364.

Casamatta, G., H. Cremer and P. Pestieau. (2000b). "The Political Economy of Social Security." Scandinavian Journal of Economics 102, 503–522.

Cremer, H. and P. Pestieau. (2000). "Reforming Our Pension System: Is It a Demographic, Financial or Political Problem?" European Economic Review 44, 974–983.

Disney, R. (1996). Can We Afford to Grow Older?. Cambridge, Ma: The MIT Press.

Grossman, G. M. and E. Helpman. (1998). "Intergenerational Redistribution with Short-lived Governments." The Economic Journal 108, 1299–1329.

Hu, S. C. (1982). "Social Security, Majority-Voting Equilibrium and Dynamic Efficiency." International Economic Review 23, 269–287.

Mulligan, C. B. and X. Sala-i-Martin. (1999). "Gerontocracy, Retirement, and Social security." NBER Working Paper No. 7117.

Tabellini, G. (2000). "A Positive Theory of Social Security." Scandinavian Journal of Economics 102, 523–545.

Thông tin
Thông tin xuất bản

International Tax and Public Finance

Tập 8

417-431

Thông tin tác giả