Projected demographic changes in industrialized countries will reduce the share of the working-age population. Analyses based on standard OLG models predict that these changes will increase the capital-labor ration. Hence, rates of return to capital decrease and wages increase with adverse...

Disability insurance - the insurance against the loss of the ability to work - is a substantial part of social security expenditures in many countries. The enrolment rates in disability insurance vary strikingly across European countries and the US. This paper investigates the extent of, and the...

In response to population aging, pay-as-you-go pensions are being reduced in almost all developed countries. In many countries, governments aim to fill the resulting gap with subsidized private pensions. This paper exploits the recent German pension reform to shed new light on the uptake of...

SHARE, a pan-European panel study of about 85,000 individuals aged 50+ in 27 Continental European countries and Israel, has collected dried blood spot (DBS) samples from approximately 27,000 respondents in 13 countries. Laboratory results from DBS assays cannot be directly compared to the...

English Abstract: Flexible retirement is supposed to increase labor supply of older workers without touching the third rail of pension politics, the highly unpopular increase of the retirement age. While this may have intuitive appeal, this paper shows that it might be wishful thinking. Economic...

German Abstract: Im Koalitionsvertrag vom 14.03.2018 wird angekündigt, die Leistungen und Beiträge der Gesetzlichen Rentenversicherung durch eine so genannte „doppelte Haltelinie“ festzuschreiben. Konkret soll das Netto-Standardrentenniveau vor Steuern nicht unter 48% absinken und...

English Abstract: The purpose of disability insurance (DI) is to protect people with health problems that limit their ability to work. We evaluate the effectiveness of DI benefit programs in delivering this protection by following people's health and financial well-being after the take-up of DI...