Discussion paper

DP6263 Choosing the Legal Retirement Age in Presence of Unemployment

The aim of this paper is to better understand the impact of unemployment on the design of Pay-As-You-Go pension systems, in the context of population aging. We consider a model in which people differ according to age and face in every period a given probability of becoming unemployed. We first determine the optimal pension system, which consists in a payroll tax rate, a pension benefit level and a retirement age and study its comparative statics with respect to a change of the unemployment rate and the length of life. We then characterize the issue-by-issue voting equilibrium and compare it to the optimal pension scheme. It is shown that the median voter in general chooses a retirement age lower than the optimal one as well as a higher payroll tax rate.

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Citation

Casamatta, G and C De Paoli (2007), ‘DP6263 Choosing the Legal Retirement Age in Presence of Unemployment‘, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 6263. CEPR Press, Paris & London. https://cepr.org/publications/dp6263