The strong and increasing positive correlation between lifetime income and life expectancy (the longevity gap) has recently been widely studied. In this paper we employ the simplest, minimal model to demonstrate the impact of this long-neglected fact on the various types of public pension...

Studying the age-dimension of the probability distribution of pensions while assuming steadily rising real wages and time-invariant benefit-rules, two factors play important roles: (i) the weight of the wages in indexation of benefits in progress; (ii) the longevity gap. Factor (i) acts against...

This purpose of this paper is to analyze pension policy in an autocracy, using contemporary Hungary as a context. The inefficiencies and unfairness of the current policy can be characterized by tensions: the intra- and intercohort polarization of benefits rises, the difference between the loose...

In this paper, we analyze Hungarian pension policies between 1998 and 2017, comparing the pre- and post-2010 periods. Before 2010, Hungary was a liberal democracy dominated by populist economic policies. We call this the period of democratic populism. After 2010, with center-right but illiberal...

Due to various causes, the pension contribution rate can be reduced temporarily below its long-term value. We call a reduction forced if the balance of the public pension system is preserved through excessive wage-hikes and irritable relative devaluation of pensions in progress. A very simple...

We reconsider the problem of indexation of public pensions, emphasizing that similar contribution paths should imply similar benefit paths. This robustness criterion is only satisfied by full wage indexing, which in turn requires the politically unpopular reduction of the accrual rates. To...