IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ifs/ifsewp/23-01.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The effect of pension wealth on employment

Author

Listed:
  • Peter Haan

    (Institute for Fiscal Studies)

  • Sebastian Becker
  • Hermann Buslei
  • Johannes Geyer

Abstract

This study provides novel evidence about the pension wealth elasticity of employment. For the identification we exploit reform-induced variation of pension wealth that is related to the number of children but which does not affect the implicit tax rate of employment. We use a difference-in-differences estimator based on administrative data from the German pension insurance and find that, on average, the negative employment effect of pension wealth is significant and economically important. Heterogeneity analyses document a strong age pattern showing that the employment effects are driven by behavioral responses of women close to retirement. The age pattern is partly explained by the positive effect of pension wealth on disability pensions after the age of 60.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Haan & Sebastian Becker & Hermann Buslei & Johannes Geyer, 2023. "The effect of pension wealth on employment," IFS Working Papers W23/01, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    • Handle: RePEc:ifs:ifsewp:23/01
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ifs.org.uk/sites/default/files/2023-01/WP202301-The-effect-of-pension-wealth-on-employment.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arnaud Chevalier & Olivier Marie, 2017. "Economic Uncertainty, Parental Selection, and Children’s Educational Outcomes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(2), pages 393-430.
    2. Weber, Andrea & Manoli, Dayanand, 2016. "The Effects of Increasing the Early Retirement Age on Employment of Older Workers," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145549, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. Giulia Giupponi, 2019. "When income effects are large: labor supply responses and the value of welfare transfers," CEP Discussion Papers dp1651, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    4. Day Manoli & Andrea Weber, 2016. "Nonparametric Evidence on the Effects of Financial Incentives on Retirement Decisions," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 8(4), pages 160-182, November.
    5. Manoli, Dayanand & Weber, Andrea, 2016. "The Effects of the Early Retirement Age on Retirement Decisions," IZA Discussion Papers 10154, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. David Cesarini & Erik Lindqvist & Matthew J. Notowidigdo & Robert Östling, 2017. "The Effect of Wealth on Individual and Household Labor Supply: Evidence from Swedish Lotteries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(12), pages 3917-3946, December.
    7. Alexander M. Danzer, 2013. "Benefit Generosity and the Income Effect on Labour Supply: Quasi‐Experimental Evidence," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 123, pages 1059-1084, September.
    8. Johannes Geyer & Clara Welteke, 2021. "Closing Routes to Retirement for Women: How Do They Respond?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 56(1), pages 311-341.
    9. Cribb, Jonathan & Emmerson, Carl & Tetlow, Gemma, 2016. "Signals matter? Large retirement responses to limited financial incentives," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 203-212.
    10. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1617 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Daniel K. Fetter & Lee M. Lockwood, 2018. "Government Old-Age Support and Labor Supply: Evidence from the Old Age Assistance Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(8), pages 2174-2211, August.
    12. Todd Morris, 2022. "The unequal burden of retirement reform: Evidence from Australia," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(2), pages 592-619, April.
    13. Michael P. Keane, 2011. "Labor Supply and Taxes: A Survey," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(4), pages 961-1075, December.
    14. Jeffrey R. Brown & Courtney C. Coile & Scott J. Weisbenner, 2010. "The Effect of Inheritance Receipt on Retirement," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(2), pages 425-434, May.
    15. Staubli, Stefan & Zweimüller, Josef, 2013. "Does raising the early retirement age increase employment of older workers?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 17-32.
    16. Arthur Seibold, 2020. "Reference Points for Retirement Behavior: Evidence From German Pension Discontinuities," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2020_226, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    17. Axel Boersch-Supan & Christina B. Wilke, 2004. "The German Public Pension System: How it Was, How it Will Be," NBER Working Papers 10525, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Kadir Atalay & Garry F. Barrett, 2015. "The Impact of Age Pension Eligibility Age on Retirement and Program Dependence: Evidence from an Australian Experiment," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 97(1), pages 71-87, March.
    19. Blundell, R. & French, E. & Tetlow, G., 2016. "Retirement Incentives and Labor Supply," Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, in: Piggott, John & Woodland, Alan (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Population Aging, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 457-566, Elsevier.
    20. Engels, Barbara & Geyer, Johannes & Haan, Peter, 2017. "Pension incentives and early retirement," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 216-231.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Carol Propper & George Stoye & Max Warner, 2023. "The effects of pension reforms on physician labour supply: Evidence from the English NHS," IFS Working Papers W23/26, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    2. Johan Saeverud, 2024. "The Impact Of Social Security Eligibility And Pension Wealth On Retirement," CEBI working paper series 24-05, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI).

    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. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1941 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Ye, Han, 2018. "The Effect of Pension Subsidies on Retirement Timing of Older Women: Evidence from a Regression Kink Design," IZA Discussion Papers 11831, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Dolls, Mathias & Krolage, Carla, 2023. "‘Earned, not given’? The effect of lowering the full retirement age on retirement decisions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    4. Todd Morris, 2022. "The unequal burden of retirement reform: Evidence from Australia," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(2), pages 592-619, April.
    5. Fürstenau, Elisabeth & Gohl, Niklas & Haan, Peter & Weinhardt, Felix, 2023. "Working life and human capital investment: Causal evidence from a pension reform," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    6. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1741 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Ardito Chiara, 2021. "The unequal impact of raising the retirement age: Employment response and program substitution," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Sciendo & Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 10(1), pages 1-37, January.
    8. Niklas Gohl, 2023. "Working Longer, Working Stronger? The Forward-Looking Effects of Increasing the Retirement Age on (Un)employment Behaviour," Berlin School of Economics Discussion Papers 0013, Berlin School of Economics.
    9. Staubli, Stefan & Lalive, Rafael & Magesan, Arvind, 2020. "The Impact of Social Security on Pension Claiming and Retirement: Active vs. Passive Decisions," CEPR Discussion Papers 15120, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1617 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Riphahn, Regina T. & Schrader, Rebecca, 2023. "Reforms of an early retirement pathway in Germany and their labor market effects," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(3), pages 304-330, July.
    12. Geyer, Johannes & Haan, Peter & Hammerschmid, Anna & Peters, Michael, 2020. "Labor Market and Distributional Effects of an Increase in the Retirement Age," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    13. Engels, Barbara & Geyer, Johannes & Haan, Peter, 2017. "Pension incentives and early retirement," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 216-231.
    14. Niklas Gohl, 2023. "Working Longer, Working Stronger? The Forward-Looking Effects of Increasing the Retirement Age on (Un)employment Behaviour," CEPA Discussion Papers 63, Center for Economic Policy Analysis.
    15. Gruber, Jonathan & Kanninen, Ohto & Ravaska, Terhi, 2022. "Relabeling, retirement and regret," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).
    16. Etgeton, Stefan & Fischer, Björn & Ye, Han, 2023. "The effect of increasing retirement age on households’ savings and consumption expenditure," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 221(C).
    17. Itay Saporta-Eksten & Ity Shurtz & Sarit Weisburd, 2021. "Social Security, Labor Supply, and Health of Older Workers: Quasi-Experimental Evidence from a Large Reform [Identification and Estimation of Local Average Treatment Effects]," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 2168-2208.
    18. García-Miralles, Esteban & Leganza, Jonathan M., 2024. "Joint retirement of couples: Evidence from discontinuities in Denmark," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 230(C).
    19. Octave Brouwer & Ilan Tojerow, 2024. "Old-age unemployment and labour supply: an application to Belgium," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 67(1), pages 253-287, July.
    20. Frimmel, Wolfgang, 2021. "Later retirement and the labor market re-integration of elderly unemployed workers," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 19(C).
    21. Zwick, Thomas & Bruns, Mona & Geyer, Johannes & Lorenz, Svenja, 2022. "Early retirement of employees in demanding jobs: Evidence from a German pension reform," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 22(C).
    22. Esteban García-Miralles & Jonathan M. Leganza, 2024. "Public Pensions and Private Savings," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 366-405, May.
    23. Giesecke, Matthias & Jäger, Philipp, 2021. "Pension incentives and labor supply: Evidence from the introduction of universal old-age assistance in the UK," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 203(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H55 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Social Security and Public Pensions
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ifs:ifsewp:23/01. 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: Emma Hyman (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ifsssuk.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.