Die Skepsis, die es von Anfang an aufgrund der fehlenden Versicherungspflicht für die Riester-Rente gab, hat sich aus Sicht des Autors bestätigt. Aus der fehlenden Verpflichtung zu einer kapitalgedeckten Altersvorsorge leiten sich auch konkrete Probleme wie eine diskussionswürdige Transparenz...

There has been skepticism from the beginning regarding the "Riester-Rente" pension scheme because it was not compulsory. From the author's point of view, this skepticism has been confirmed. The lack of commitment to the Riester pension system leads to concrete problems including debatable...

In this paper we analyse several measures which are typically included in a social security reform: a cut in the social security benefits, an increase in the social security tax and tax incentives for the purchase of private life annuities, which have recently become quite popular at the...

There are two stylised facts, namely weak demand for life-annuities and flat age-wealth profile that contradict the life-cycle hypothesis. In this paper we design a theoretical framework, which combines plausible arguments, which have been put forward in the literature to reconcile theory with...

How might retirees consider deploying the retirement assets accumulated in a defined contribution pension plan? One possibility would be to purchase an immediate annuity. Another approach, called the 'phased withdrawal' strategy in the literature, would have the retiree invest his funds and then...

Retirees confront the difficult problem of how to manage their money in retirement so as to not outlive their funds while continuing to invest in capital markets. We posit a dynamic utility maximizer who makes both asset location and allocation decisions when managing her retirement financial...

This paper demonstrates that the link between heterogeneity in longevity and lifetime income across countries is mostly high and often increasing; that it translates into an implicit tax/subsidy, with rates reaching 20 percent and higher in some countries; that such rates risk perverting...

The aging of the population causes unfavourable demographic trends that are significantly affecting the current state and the future of pension systems on a global basis. The increased number of pensioners and a significant decrease in the rate of demographic reproduction have negative effects...

The dramatic rise in the disability insurance (DI) rolls in the last 20 years has been the subject of much controversy. While the relationship between DI and labor force participation has been the subject of a growing literature, the mechanism of this transition from employment to DI remains...

This chapter defines a universal public pension scheme (UPPS) as a government-mandated lifecycle longevity insurance scheme that transfers individual consumption from the working years to the retirement phase of the lifecycle. It discusses the differences in four UPPS designs defined with regard...