When the challenges of population aging are being debated, the uncertain future of pension systems is a topic of high priority and large controversy. The aim of this chapter is not to provide a “consensus view” on social security and public insurance in aging populations but to put structure...

We study the transitions from career to gradual and permanent retirement by a sample of (Continental) European males aged 55 to 70 in the late 2000s. We find that only 14.6% of the workers in this sample moved from a career to a bridge job by the time of the interview, much less than in the...

High levels of unemployment and rising social charges have lead to considerable pressure on labour markets to adjust. Major steps in labour market reform have been implemented over the last three years. These need to be followed up in several respects in order to raise the economy’s capacity...

With almost 50 per cent of the working age population not working, improving labour market performance represents an essential and daunting challenge for Poland. While some of today’s joblessness is cyclical in nature, most of it appears to be structural. This paper argues that to increase...

"In Germany, older unemployed people aged 58 or more years have been exempt from a fundamental principle of activating labour market policy until 2007: They have been entitled to unemployment benefit payments until taking up retirement pension without having to seek new employment (Section 428...

How can public pension systems be reformed to ensure fiscal stability in the face of increasing life expectancy? To address this question, we use micro data to estimate a structural life-cycle model of individuals’ employment, retirement and consumption decisions. We calculate that, in the...

"In Germany, older unemployed people aged 58 or more years have been exempt from a fundamental principle of activating labour market policy until 2007: They have been entitled to unemployment benefit payments until taking up retirement pension without having to seek new employment (Section 428...

This paper interprets accidents occurring on the way to and from work as negative health shocks to identify the causal effect of health on labor market outcomes. We argue that in our sample of exactly matched injured and non-injured workers, these health shocks (predominantly impairments in the...

The chapter examines how the various dimensions of economic inequality between men and women are analyzed today. Beyond the gender wage gap—a central issue—and of course the still far from equal sharing of housework, the chapter also reviews research on gender inequality in access to...

According to the World Health Organization, depression is the highest ranking cause of disease in middle- and high income countries; it costs Europe around EUR 118 billion a year, mostly through lost productivity on the labour market, i.e. labour supply loss, sickness absence, and poor...