In several OECD countries, public pay-as-you-go financed pension systems have undergone major reforms in which future retirement benefit promises have been scaled down. A consequence of these reforms is that especially in countries with a tight tax-benefit linkage, the retirement benefit claims...

Nachdem die Bundeskanzlerin Mitte dieses Jahres eine Angleichung der Rentenwerte in Ost- und Westdeutschland angeregt hat, greifen zurzeit vor allem Politiker aus Ostdeutschland diesen Vorschlag im Rahmen einer Altersarmutsdebatte auf. Zur Angleichung der Ost-Renten werden im politischen Raum...

Building on the existing literature that examines the extent of redistribution in the Social Security system as a whole, this paper focuses more specifically on how Social Security affects the poor. This question is important because a Social Security program that reduces overall inequality by...