IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/iiessp/0631.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Intergenerational Risk Sharing, Stability and Optimality of Alternative Pension Systems

Author

Listed:
  • Hassler, John

    (Institute for International Economic Studies, Stockholm University)

  • Lindbeck, Assar

    (Institute for International Economic Studies, Stockholm University)

Abstract

In an analysis of the risk-sharing properties of different types of pension systems, we show that only a fixed-fee pay-as-you-go (PAYG) pension systems can provide intergenerational risk sharing for living individuals. Under some circumstances, however, other PAYG pension systems can enhance the expected welfare of all generations by reducing intergenerational income variability. We derive conditions for this to occur. We also analyze the stability of actuarially fair PAYG pension systems. It is shown that if an actuarially fair pension with a non-balanced budget system is dynamically stable, its accumulated surpluses will converge to the same fund as in a fully funded system. We also show that the welfare loss due to labor market distortions will, in fact, increase if the implicit marginal return in a compulsory system is raised above the average return.

Suggested Citation

  • Hassler, John & Lindbeck, Assar, 1997. "Intergenerational Risk Sharing, Stability and Optimality of Alternative Pension Systems," Seminar Papers 631, Stockholm University, Institute for International Economic Studies.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:iiessp:0631
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://su.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:327688/FULLTEXT01
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Feldstein, Martin, 1996. "The Missing Piece in Policy Analysis: Social Security Reform," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(2), pages 1-14, May.
    2. Hassler, John & Lindbeck, Assar, 1997. "Optimal actuarial fairness in pension systems: A note," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 251-255, August.
    3. Barro, Robert J, 1974. "Are Government Bonds Net Wealth?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(6), pages 1095-1117, Nov.-Dec..
    4. Enders, Walter & Lapan, Harvey E, 1982. "Social Security Taxation and Intergenerational Risk Sharing," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 23(3), pages 647-658, October.
    5. Blanchard Olivier & Weil Philippe, 2001. "Dynamic Efficiency, the Riskless Rate, and Debt Ponzi Games under Uncertainty," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 1(2), pages 1-23, November.
    6. Paul A. Samuelson, 1958. "An Exact Consumption-Loan Model of Interest with or without the Social Contrivance of Money," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 66(6), pages 467-467.
    7. Attanasio, Orazio & Davis, Steven J, 1996. "Relative Wage Movements and the Distribution of Consumption," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(6), pages 1227-1262, December.
    8. Gordon, Roger H. & Varian, Hal R., 1988. "Intergenerational risk sharing," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 185-202, November.
    9. Smith, Alasdair, 1982. "Intergenerational transfers as social insurance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 97-106, October.
    10. Zilcha, Itzhak, 1991. "Characterizing efficiency in stochastic overlapping generations models," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 1-16, October.
    11. Bohn, Henning, 1995. "The Sustainability of Budget Deficits in a Stochastic Economy," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 27(1), pages 257-271, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sinn, Hans-Werner, 2004. "The pay-as-you-go pension system as fertility insurance and an enforcement device," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1335-1357, July.
    2. Elmendorf, Douglas W. & Gregory Mankiw, N., 1999. "Government debt," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & M. Woodford (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 25, pages 1615-1669, Elsevier.
    3. Julia, Knolle, 2014. "An Empirical Comparison of Interest and Growth Rates," MPRA Paper 59520, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Stefan Homburg, 2014. "Overaccumulation, Public Debt and the Importance of Land," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 15(4), pages 411-435, November.
    5. Antonio Rangel & Richard Zeckhauser, 2001. "Can Market and Voting Institutions Generate Optimal Intergenerational Risk Sharing?," NBER Chapters, in: Risk Aspects of Investment-Based Social Security Reform, pages 113-152, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Simon Fan & Yu Pang & Pierre Pestieau, 2022. "Investment in children, social security, and intragenerational risk sharing," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(2), pages 286-315, April.
    7. Buiter, Willem H. & Kletzer, Kenneth, 1992. "Government Solvency, Ponzi Finance and the Redundancy and Usefulness of Public Debt," CEPR Discussion Papers 680, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    8. Bohn, Henning, 1998. "Risk Sharing in a Stochastic Overlapping Generations Economy," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt9r2809f0, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    9. repec:fth:calaec:10-97 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Hassler, John & Lindbeck, Assar, 1998. "Can and Should a Pay-As-You-Go Pension System Mimic a Funded System?," Working Paper Series 499, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    11. repec:cdl:ucsbec:10-97 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Matsen, Egil & Thogersen, Oystein, 2004. "Designing social security - a portfolio choice approach," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 883-904, August.
    13. Stéphane Guibaud & Yves Nosbusch & Dimitri Vayanos, 2013. "Bond Market Clienteles, the Yield Curve, and the Optimal Maturity Structure of Government Debt," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(8), pages 1914-1961.
    14. Borgmann, Christoph, 2002. "Labor income risk, demographic risk, and the design of (wage-indexed) social security," Discussion Papers 100, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Institut für Finanzwissenschaft.
    15. Kruse, Agneta, 2000. "Pension Reforms; Effects on Intergenerational Risk-Sharing and Redistribution," Working Papers 2000:10, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    16. Wigniolle, B., 2014. "Optimism, pessimism and financial bubbles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 188-208.
    17. Kruse, Agneta, 2002. "Ageing Populations and Intergenerational Risk-sharing in PAYG Pension Schemes," Working Papers 2002:18, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    18. Barbie, Martin & Hagedorn, Marcus & Kaul, Ashok, 2001. "Government Debt as Insurance against Macroeconomic Risk," IZA Discussion Papers 412, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    19. Philippe Weil, 2008. "Overlapping Generations: The First Jubilee," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 115-134, Fall.
    20. Koumparoulis, Dimitrios, 2006. "Ευρωπαϊκή Δημοσιονομική Πολιτική Και Οικονομική Μεγέθυνση: Η Νεοκλασική Οικονομική Θεωρία Για Την Περίπτωση Της Ελλάδας [European Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth: The Neoclassical Economic Theory," MPRA Paper 44310, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. Torben M. Andersen & Joydeep Bhattacharya & Qing Liu, 2021. "Reference‐dependent preferences, time inconsistency, and pay‐as‐you‐go pensions," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 59(3), pages 1008-1030, July.
    22. Debora Kusmerski Bilard, 2008. "Optimal Sharing of Labor Productivity Risks and Mix of Pay-As-You-Go and Savings," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 08-066/1, Tinbergen Institute, revised 09 Aug 2012.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Pension systems; Pay-as-you-go; intergenerational;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H55 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Social Security and Public Pensions

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hhs:iiessp:0631. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Hanna Christiansson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iiesuse.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.