Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World
The Effects of Reforms on Retirement Behavior
Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World
The Effects of Reforms on Retirement Behavior
A global analysis of the effects of social security reforms on the retirement incentives and labor force trends of older workers.
Employment among older men and women has increased dramatically in recent years, reversing a downward trend in the closing decades of the twentieth century. Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World examines how changing retirement incentives have reshaped labor force participation trends among older workers. The chapters feature country-specific analyses for Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. They find that while there is significant heterogeneity across countries, the reforms of recent decades have generally reduced the implicit tax on work at older ages. These changes correlate positively with labor force participation. The studies exploit the variation in the timing and extent of reforms of retirement incentives and employ microeconometric methods to investigate whether this correlation reflects a causal relationship. Policy changes appear to have contributed to rising labor force activity, but other factors like the role of women in the labor force, improved health, and changes in private pensions likely also play important roles.
488 pages | 51 halftones, 139 line drawings, 86 tables | 6 x 9 | © 2025
National Bureau of Economic Research Conference Report
Economics and Business: Economics--Government Finance
Table of Contents
Introduction
Axel Börsch-Supan and Courtney C. Coile
1. Trends in Social Security Incentives in Belgium
Anne-Lore Fraikin, Alain Jousten, and Mathieu Lefebvre
2. Retirement Decisions and Retirement Incentives: New Evidence from Canada
Kevin Milligan and Tammy Schirle
3. The Role of Social Security Reforms in Explaining Changing Retirement Behavior in Denmark, 1980–2016
Paul Bingley, Nabanita Datta Gupta, Malene Kallestrup-Lamb, and Peder J. Pedersen
4. Financial Incentives and Labor Force Participation of Older Workers: Evidence from France
Antoine Bozio, Simon Rabaté, Maxime Tô, and Julie Tréguier
5. Retirement Decisions in Germany: Micromodeling
Axel Börsch-Supan, Irene Ferrari, Nicolas Goll, and Johannes Rausch
6. The Effect of Retirement Incentives: Microevidence for Italy
Agar Brugiavini, Raluca Elena Buia, Giacomo Pasini, and Guglielmo Weber
7. The Relationship between Social Security Programs and Elderly Employment in Japan
Takashi Oshio, Satoshi Shimizutani, and Akiko S. Oishi
8. The Effects of Social Insurance Benefits on Leaving Employment at Older Ages in the Netherlands
Adriaan Kalwij and Arie Kapteyn
9. The Effects of Social Security Incentives on Retirement in Spain
Pilar García-Gómez, Sílvia Garcia-Mandicó, Sergi Jiménez-Martín, and Judit Vall-Castelló
10. Pension Reform, Incentives to Retire, and Retirement Behavior: Empirical Evidence from Swedish Microdata
Lisa Laun and Mårten Palme
11. Are Longer Working Lives a Response to Changing Financial Incentives? Exploiting Micro Panel Data from the UK
James Banks, Carl Emmerson, and David Sturrock
12. Changing Retirement Incentives and Retirement in the US
Courtney C. Coile
Author Index
Subject Index