The authors consider a transitory demographic shock that affects negatively the financing of retirement pensions-that is, workers either would have to pay more or retirees would receive less. In contrast to the existing literature, the authors endogenously determine optimal policies rather than...

The choice of the intertemporal discount rate affects the measurement of the tax burden of different age cohorts. Small changes in the discount rate affect not only the magnitude of the measured changes, but also the ranking of policies using that metric. The authors illustrate this problem in...

This article reviews the characteristics of different social security systems. Many configurations arise depending on the nature of a system’s funding and determination of benefits. Many reforms propose changing the U.S. Social Security system. The authors focus their analysis of the...