Disabled insurance (DI) beneficiaries lose benefits if labor incomes exceed certain thresholds (so called cash-cliffs ). The high implicit taxation of employment income is considered one of the prime reasons for the low outflow from the disability insurance. This paper presents the results of...

Early retirement is predominantly considered as the result of incentives set by social security and the tax system. But people seem to retire early even in the absence of such distortions as the Swiss example demonstrates. We look for determinants of early retirement, in particular the role of...

We explore the incentives countries face in trade litigation within the new WTO Dispute Settlement System. Our analysis yields a number of interesting predictions. First, because sanctions are ruled out during the litigation process, the Dispute Settlement System does not preclude all new trade...

Child-care subsidies are meant to facilitate work for mothers with small children. The paper demonstrates that the predominant current income-dependent subsidy scheme in Switzerland (which is currently also discussed in Germany) creates strong negative work incentives especially for well...

The reform of old age insurance is one of the pressing problems of Swiss Society. A key policy issue in the ongoing debate is flexibility to better suit the different individual needs of pensioners. This paper argues that more flexible retirement options can have strong impacts on both the...

This paper empirically analyses two important events in the history of the Swiss pay-asyou- go pension system (AHV/AVS): First, its introduction in 1947, and second, the substantial structural reforms of the 10th revision in 1995. Approving vote shares are estimated with a grouped logit model....

We analyze the effect of means-tested benefits on annuitization decisions. Most industrialized countries provide a subsistence level consumption floor in old age, usually in the form of means-tested benefits. The availability of such means-tested payments creates an incentive to cash out...