The German pension system was the first formal pension system in the world, designed by Bismarck nearly 120 years ago. It has been very successful in providing high and reliable pension levels at reasonable contribution rates. While the generosity of the German pension system is considered a...

Notional defined contribution (NDC) systems have strongly been being debated in the worldwide pension literature in the past years. This paper deals with the feasibility of such NDC systems. The focus is on the German case, where the recent 2004 pension reform introduced a so-called...