IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/0186.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Do Private Pensions Increase National Saving?

Author

Listed:
  • Martin Feldstein

Abstract

This paper discusses how private pension programs differ from public social security in their likely impact on aggregate saving. Although private pensions are likely to reduce direct saving by employees, this should be offset by the combination of companies' partial funding and the shareholders response to unfunded liabilities. In contrast to several earlier empirical studies that implied that social security does depress national saving, the current time series evidence suggests that the growth of private pensions has not had an adverse effect on saving and may have increased saving by a small amount.

Suggested Citation

  • Martin Feldstein, 1980. "Do Private Pensions Increase National Saving?," NBER Working Papers 0186, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:0186
    Note: PE
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w0186.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. 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..
    2. Boskin, Michael J, 1978. "Taxation, Saving, and the Rate of Interest," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(2), pages 3-27, April.
    3. Feldstein, Martin & Liebman, Jeffrey B., 2002. "Social security," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 32, pages 2245-2324, Elsevier.
    4. Schoeplein, Robert N, 1970. "The Effect of Pension Plans on Other Retirement Saving," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 25(3), pages 633-637, June.
    5. Feldstein, Martin S., 1973. "Tax incentives, corporate saving, and capital accumulation in the United States," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(2), pages 159-171, April.
    6. Michael J. Boskin, 1978. "Taxation, Saving, and the Rate of Interest," NBER Chapters, in: Research in Taxation, pages 3-27, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Martin Feldstein & Anthony J. Pellechio, 1980. "Social Security and Household Wealth Accumulation: New Microeconomic Evidence," NBER Working Papers 0206, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Oldfield, George S, Jr, 1977. "Financial Aspects of the Private Pension System," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 9(1), pages 48-54, February.
    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. David Blake, 2004. "The impact of wealth on consumption and retirement behaviour in the UK," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(8), pages 555-576.
    2. E Philip Davis, 1996. "The Role of Institutional Investors in the Evolution of Financial Structure and Behaviour," RBA Annual Conference Volume (Discontinued), in: Malcom Edey (ed.),The Future of the Financial System, Reserve Bank of Australia.
    3. Feldstein, Martin, 1980. "International differences in social security and saving," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 225-244, October.
    4. Impavido, Gregorio & Musalem, Alberto R., 2000. "Contractual savings, stock, and asset markets," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2490, The World Bank.
    5. Yannis A. Monogios & Christos Pitelis, 2004. "On (Ultra) rationality and the corporate and government veils," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 72(3), pages 382-402, June.
    6. Olivia S. Mitchell & James F. Moore, "undated". "Retirement Wealth Accumulation and Decumulation: New Developments and Outstanding Opportunities," Pension Research Council Working Papers 97-8, Wharton School Pension Research Council, University of Pennsylvania.
    7. Raffaele Bruni, 1996. "The presence of occupational pension schemes within the overall pension scene," Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, , vol. 2(4), pages 699-723, November.
    8. Frank A. Sloan & Killard W. Adamache, 1986. "Taxation and the Growth of Nonwage Compensation," Public Finance Review, , vol. 14(2), pages 115-137, April.
    9. Martin Feldstein, 1982. "Private Pensions as Corporate Debt," NBER Chapters, in: The Changing Roles of Debt and Equity in Financing U.S. Capital Formation, pages 75-90, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Davis, E.P. & DEC, 1993. "The structure, regulation, and performance of pension funds in nine industrial countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1229, The World Bank.
    11. Gary V. Engelhardt, 2000. "Have 401(k)s Raised Household Saving? Evidence from the Health and Retirement Study," Social and Economic Dimensions of an Aging Population Research Papers 33, McMaster University.
    12. Benjamin M. Friedman, 1980. "Effects of Shifting Saving Patterns on Interest Rates and Economic Activity," NBER Working Papers 0587, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. repec:dau:papers:123456789/6125 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Martin Feldstein, 1979. "The Effect of Social Security on Saving," NBER Working Papers 0334, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Martin Janssen & Heinz Müller, 1983. "Die Substitutionswirkungen zwischen kollektiver Vorsorge und privatem Sparen in der Schweiz," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 119(II), pages 139-145, June.
    16. Rafal Chomik & John Piggott, 2016. "Australian Superannuation: The Current State of Play," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 49(4), pages 483-493, December.
    17. Catalan, Mario & Impavido, Gregorio & Musalem, Alberto R., 2000. "Contractual savings or stock market development - Which leads?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2421, The World Bank.
    18. Hidalgo, Pedro & Manzur, Enrique & Olavarrieta, Sergio & Fari­as, Pablo, 2008. "Customer retention and price matching: The AFPs case," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 61(6), pages 691-696, June.
    19. Gersovitz, Mark, 1982. "Economic consequences of unfunded vested pension benefits," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 171-186, November.

    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. Alan J. Auerbach, 1990. "Public Sector Dynamics," NBER Working Papers 3508, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Bernheim, B. Douglas, 2002. "Taxation and saving," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 18, pages 1173-1249, Elsevier.
    3. Lawrence H. Summers, 1982. "Tax Policy, the Rate of Return, and Savings," NBER Working Papers 0995, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Fischer, Marcel & Jensen, Bjarne Astrup, 2017. "The debt tax shield, economic growth and inequality," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 219, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.
    5. Lawrence H. Summers, 1978. "Tax Policy in a Life Cycle Model," NBER Working Papers 0302, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. R. Glenn Hubbard, 1984. "'Precautionary' Saving Revisited: Social Security, Individual Welfare, and the Capital Stock," NBER Working Papers 1430, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Engen, Eric M. & Gravelle, Jane G. & Smetters, Kent, 1997. "Dynamic Tax Models: Why They Do the Things They Do," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 50(3), pages 657-682, September.
    8. Feldstein, Martin, 1982. "Government deficits and aggregate demand," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 1-20.
    9. Hausman, Jerry A & Poterba, James M, 1987. "Household Behavior and the Tax Reform Act of 1986," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 1(1), pages 101-119, Summer.
    10. Alan J. Auerbach & Laurence J. Kotlikoff, 1983. "National Savings, Economic Welfare, and the Structure of Taxation," NBER Chapters, in: Behavioral Simulation Methods in Tax Policy Analysis, pages 459-498, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Francisco Alvarez‐Cuadrado & Mayssun El‐Attar Vilalta, 2018. "Income Inequality and Saving," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 80(6), pages 1029-1061, December.
    12. Douglas W. Elmendorf, "undated". "The Effect of Interest-Rate Changes on Household Saving and Consumption: A Survey," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1996-27, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), revised 10 Dec 2019.
    13. repec:idb:brikps:377 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Michael J. Boskin & Laurence J. Kotlikoff, 1985. "Pubic Debt and U.S. Saving: A New Test of the Neutrality Hypothesis," NBER Working Papers 1646, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Edwards, Sebastian, 1996. "Why are Latin America's savings rates so low? An international comparative analysis," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 5-44, October.
    16. Sebastian Edwards, 1994. "Macroeconomic Stabilization in Latin America: Recent Experience and Some Sequencing Issues," NBER Working Papers 4697, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Louis Dicks-Mireaux & Mervyn A. King, 1982. "Pension Wealth and Household Savings: Tests of Robustness," NBER Working Papers 0962, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Richard Cebula & Chao-Shun Hung & Neela Manage, 1996. "Ricardian equivalence, budget deficits, and saving in the United States, 1955:1-1991:4," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(8), pages 525-528.
    19. Feldstein, Martin, 1995. "Fiscal policies, capital formation, and capitalism," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(3-4), pages 399-420, April.
    20. Uhlig, H.F.H.V.S. & Yanagawa, N., 1994. "Increasing the Capital Income Tax Leads to Faster Growth," Other publications TiSEM e758dab5-3682-4351-b0e0-0, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    21. Chamley, Christophe, 1981. "The Welfare Cost of Capital Income Taxation in a Growing Economy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(3), pages 468-496, June.

    More about this item

    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:nbr:nberwo:0186. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.