The paper investigates the impacts of demographic change on the financial sustainability of a pay-as-you-go social security system in an economy with unemployment caused by trade unions. Using a simple two-period overlapping generations approach, it can be shown that the trade union behavior...

Unter dem Schlagwort «Maschinensteuer» werden seit Ende der siebziger Jahre alternative Bemessungsgrundlagen für die Arbeitgeberbeiträge zur Rentenversicherung diskutiert. Dabei dominieren beschäftigungspolitische und fiskalische Aspekte. Die Anhänger einer Umstellung des...

This paper analyzes the welfare effects of the Italian social security system in an economy with uncertainty on wages, financial market returns and life expectancy. The introduction of a pension system reproducing the Italian statutory scheme turns out to decrease ex-ante individual welfare,...

We study the welfare effects of earnings testing flat-rate old-age benefits in a quantitative overlapping generations model with idiosyncratic labor income risk. In our model economy, even a moderate earnings testing reduces individuals' expected lifetime utility, whenever other taxes are taken...