This paper studies the problem of redistribution between individuals having different mortality rates. We use a continuous time model in which there are two types of individuals characterized by different survival probability paths. Individual preferences are represented by a generalized...

This paper studies the normative problem of redistribution between individuals who differ in their lifespans. We discuss aspects related to the objective function and argue that aversion to multiperiod inequality should be taken into account. Then, we study the properties of the social optimum...

This paper analyses the changes to the tax and social security systems that have occurred since Czechoslovakia's `velvet revolution' in 1989. It shows how the tax system is moving to meet the requirements of a market economy. It suggests that a particularly high priority has to be given to...

Many reform proposals of the social security systems in various OECD economies suggest to scale down the non-actuarial parts of the pension systems. These reforms have a flavor of increased efficiency at the costs of welfare losses for low-income individuals. Assessing the economic effects, we...

This paper discusses the welfare implications of a pay-as-you-go pension reform by introducing a child benefit in an endogenous fertility setting. In the model of a small open economy, higher fertility is associated with a reduction of lifetime labour supply. The optimum share of...

The Swedish universal welfare model relies on a high tax level to finance a variety of transfers to the workingage population both in the form of income replacements and income supplements and as services for health-, child- and elderly care. The available evidence, reviewed in this <I>Working...</i>

The paper examines the possible effects of introducing a large-scale welfare reform in Sweden, namely, the introduction of comprehensive welfare accounts. Under this policy, individuals make mandatory contributions to accounts, which they can top up with voluntary contributions. In return,...

We quantify the labor supply responses of prime-aged adults to the presence of pensioners in their households, using longitudinal data collected in South Africa. We compare households and individuals before and after pension receipt and pension loss, which allows us to control for a host of...

In this paper we investigate why and to what extent the government should have a social security trust fund, and how it should manage the fund in the face of demographic shocks, based on a simple overlapping-generations model. We show that, given an aging population, a trust fund in some form...

The analysis provides a new explanation for two widespread problems concerning European unemployment policy: the disappointingly small effect of many past reform measures on unemployment; and the political difficulties in implementing more extensive reform programmes. We argue that the heart of...