Social Security and Retirement around the World (National Bureau of Economic Research Conference Report) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0226310116 ISBN 13: 9780226310114

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 1999

Synopsis

What accounts for the striking decline in labor force participation at increasingly younger ages? Social Security and Retirement around the World examines one explanation: social security programs actually provide incentives for early retirement. This volume houses a set of remarkable papers that present information on the social security systems, and labor force participation patterns, in Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
 
"This book is highly recommended for the serious student of retirement age trends and social security old-age pension policies of industrial nations in a cross-national context." Martin B. Tracy, Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare
 
“A path-breaking public-policy study. The authors consistently use a new methodology to evaluate the consequences of retirement systems on the behavior of older workers in eleven industrialized countries. In doing so, the book passes a major test of any conference volume the whole greatly exceeds the sum of its parts. This book without question provides the most consistent cross-national analyses of the work disincentives of retirement programs ever produces. Moreover it will serve as the model for all future efforts of this kind.” Journal of Economics

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: Micro-Estimation represents the second stage of an ongoing research project studying the relationship between social security and labor supply. In the first volume, Jonathan Gruber and David A. Wise revealed enormous disincentives to continued work at older ages in developed countries. Provisions in many social security programs were shown to encourage retirement by reducing total compensation for work, thereby inducing older employees to leave the labor force early, magnifying the financial burden caused by population aging. At a certain age there simply is little financial benefit to continued work in many countries.

In this volume, Jonathan Gruber and David A. Wise turn to a country-by-country analysis of retirement behavior based on micro-data. The result of research compiled by teams in twelve countries, the papers in this volume show a strong relationship between levels of social security incentives and retirement behavior in each country. Further, the estimates show that the effect is strikingly uniform in countries with very different cultural histories, labor market institutions, and other social characteristics.

The key advantage of the micro-estimation approach of this volume is that in each country the effects on retirement of changes in social security provisions can be predicted. To demonstrate the effects of such changes, each of the papers here includes simulations of the effects of two illustrative reforms. One illustrative reform delays the benefit eligibility ages in each of the countries. A second illustrative reform assumes common provisions in each of the countries-reducing retirement incentives in some countries and increasing incentives in others.

Utilizing the best methods, the conclusions to be drawn from Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: Micro-Estimation will provide economists with the freshest and most provoking research yet in the ongoing debate regarding social security.

About the Author:

Jonathan Gruber is a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and director of research for the National Bureau of Economic Research's program on children. David A. Wise is the John F. Stambaugh Professor of Political Economy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and director of health and retirement programs at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0226310116
• ISBN 13: 9780226310114
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 496
• Editor: Gruber Jonathan, Wise David A.