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on Economics of Ageing |
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| By: | Peter Walkenhorst; Urban Sila |
| Abstract: | Slovenia’s population is set to age rapidly in the coming decades. This demographic trend will increasingly put pressure on already fragile public finances as age related expenditure is projected to rise by 3 percentage points of GDP by the year 2030. Ensuring debt sustainability and generational equity requires reforms of social support systems and necessitates adjustments in labour markets. Policy makers will thus need to act more strongly than in the past to rein in ageing related outlays, pursue efficiency-enhancing restructurings of health and long-term care systems, and adopt measures to strengthen labour force participation. In particular, further increases in the relatively low pension age in line with the rise in life expectancy would reduce pension costs and the burden on the active population. Better utilisation of medical resources and coordinated purchasing of medical supplies would curb health care expenditure, while a dedicated funding mechanism for long-term care would enhance the sustainability of the system. Moreover, removing incentives for early retirement in combination with active labour market policies would increase the labour force participation rates of older workers from its currently very low levels. This Working Paper relates to the 2015 OECD Economic Survey of Slovenia (www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/economic-survey-slovenia.htm).<P>Les conséquences économiques d'une population vieillissante en Slovénie<BR>La population de la Slovénie vieillira rapidement dans les prochaines décennies. Cette tendance démographique mettra la pression de plus en plus sur les finances publiques déjà fragiles, car les dépenses liées au vieillissement devraient augmenter de 3 points de pourcentage du PIB d'ici l'an 2030. Assurer la viabilité de la dette et l'équité intergénérationnelle exige des réformes des systèmes de soutien social et nécessite des ajustements du marché du travail. Les décideurs devront donc agir plus fortement que par le passé à freiner les dépenses liées au vieillissement, de poursuivre les restructurations améliorant l'efficacité des systèmes de santé et de soins de longue durée, et d'adopter des mesures visant à renforcer la participation au marché du travail. En particulier, de nouvelles augmentations du relativement faible âge de la retraite en ligne avec la hausse de l'espérance de vie réduiraient les coûts de pension et le fardeau sur la population active. Une meilleure utilisation des ressources médicales et l'achat coordonné de fournitures médicales freinerait les dépenses de soins de santé, tandis qu’un mécanisme de financement spécifique pour les soins à long terme renforcerait la viabilité du système. En outre, la suppression des incitations à la retraite anticipée en combinaison avec les politiques du marché du travail active entraîneraient une augmentation des taux d'activité des travailleurs âgés au marché du travail de ses actuellement très faibles niveaux. Ce Document de travail se rapporte à l’Étude économique de l’OCDE de la Slovénie, 2015 (www.oecd.org/fr/eco/etudes/etude-econom ique-slovenie.htm). |
| Keywords: | ageing populations, long-term care, health care systems, pension system, vieillissement de la population, système de retraite, système de santé |
| JEL: | H55 I1 J1 |
| Date: | 2015–07–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oec:ecoaaa:1242-en&r=age |
| By: | Robert L. Clark; Emma Hanson; Olivia S. Mitchell |
| Abstract: | We explore what happened when the state of Utah moved away from its traditional defined benefit pension. In its place, it offered new hires a choice between a conventional defined contribution plan and a hybrid plan option, where the latter has both a guaranteed benefit component and a defined contribution plan where employees bear investment risk. We show that around 60 percent of new hires failed to make any active choice and, as a result, were automatically defaulted into the hybrid plan. Slightly more than half of those who made an active choice elected the hybrid plan. Post-reform, employees who failed to actively elect a primary retirement plan were also far less likely to enroll in a supplemental retirement account, compared to new hires who actively selected a plan. We also find that employees hired following the reform were more likely to leave public employment, resulting in higher separation rates. This could reflect a reduction in the desirability of public employment under the new pension design and an improving economic climate in the state. Our results imply that public pension reformers must consider employee responses in addition to potential cost savings, when developing and enacting major pension plan changes. |
| JEL: | H55 H75 J26 J38 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21385&r=age |
| By: | Tania Burchardt; Polly Vizard |
| Abstract: | The report uses the Adult Inpatient Survey 2012 to build up an in-depth quantitative evidence base on older people's experiences of dignity and nutrition during hospital stays in England. The survey covers adults aged 16 or above who stay in hospital for at least one night. The research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, Research Grant ES/K004018/1. |
| Keywords: | dignity,nutrition,elderly,social care,health |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:sticab:34&r=age |
| By: | Robert L. Clark; Emma Hanson; Melinda Sandler Morrill; Aditi Pathak |
| Abstract: | Unlike private sector employers, public school districts generally offer more than one type of supplemental retirement savings plan and allow multiple vendors to offer products. Using individual-level payroll data from over half of the public school districts in North Carolina coupled with data from an employer survey, this study examines the impact of inter-district differences in supplemental plan administration on participation in these savings vehicles. We find wide variation in total participation rates and in 403(b) plan participation rates in particular, even among this population of public-sector workers with the same defined benefit pension plan, health plan, and retiree health coverage. Individual and district characteristics explain some, but not all, of the variation observed. |
| JEL: | H75 J26 J45 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21382&r=age |
| By: | Pierre-Carl Michaud; Italo A. Gutierrez |
| Abstract: | We estimate the effects of employer downsizing on older workers’ health outcomes using different approaches to control for endogeneity and sample selection. With the exception of the instrumental variables approach, which provides large imprecise estimates, our results suggest that employer downsizing increases the probability that older workers rate their health as fair or poor; increases the risk of showing symptoms of clinical depression; and increases the risk of being diagnosed with stroke, arthritis, and psychiatric or emotional problems. We find weaker evidence that downsizing increases the risk of showing high levels of C-reactive protein (CRP), a measure of general inflammation. We find that downsizing affects health by increasing job insecurity and stress, but that its effects remain statistically significant after controlling for these pathways, suggesting that other mechanisms such as diminished morale and general demotivation also affect worker health. Our findings suggest that employers ought to consider actions to offset the detrimental health effects of reducing personnel on their remaining (older) workers. |
| Keywords: | Older workers, employer downsizing, health outcomes, |
| JEL: | I12 M51 |
| Date: | 2015–07–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cir:cirwor:2015s-34&r=age |
| By: | David Neumark; Joanne Song; Patrick Button |
| Abstract: | We explore the effects of disability discrimination laws on hiring of older workers. A concern with anti-discrimination laws is that they may reduce hiring by raising the cost of terminations and – in the specific case of disability discrimination laws – raising the cost of employment because of the need to accommodate disabled workers. Moreover, disability discrimination laws can affect non-disabled older workers because they are fairly likely to develop work-related disabilities, yet are not protected by these laws. Using state variation in disability discrimination protections, we find little or no evidence that stronger disability discrimination laws lower the hiring of non-disabled older workers. We similarly find no evidence of adverse effects of disability discrimination laws on hiring of disabled older workers. |
| JEL: | J14 J71 J78 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21379&r=age |
| By: | Charles Henrique Correa |
| Abstract: | Although fertility rates at very low levels negatively affect the number of people in the labor force, the average lifetime of each person in the labor market may increase with the fall of mortality rates, ceteris paribus. Therefore, during demographic transition, the size of labor force would decrease, but the average lifetime of each person in the labor market would increase. In this research, working life expectancies are estimated with 2000 and 2010 Census data by the Sullivan method to analyze the level and structure of working life expectancies in Brazil. Life expectations do not have influence of age composition, which allows comparison of the measures in time and space without that bias. The results show that, on average, working life expectancy at 15 years old increased from 32.5 years in 2000 to 34.5 years in 2010. Therefore, although the size of labor force has been negatively affected by fertility decline, people had higher expectations to remain in the labor market during the remaining life. Between 2000 and 2010, the observed increase of the working life expectancy was 50% due to the decline in mortality rates and 50% due to changes in activity rates. Between sexes, while male expectation was most affected by mortality, female expectation was most affected by activity rates |
| Date: | 2015–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bcb:wpaper:389&r=age |
| By: | Keunock Lew (Seoul National University of Science & Technology); Seungryul Ma (Government Employees Pension Foundation) |
| Abstract: | The paper conducted a concurrent simulation analysis to evaluate guarantor's risk in the reverse mortgage annuity program, considering that key variables of the program change simultaneously with their own stochastic processes. From the analysis with the data covering a period from September 2004 to December 2014, it was revealed that the probability of the guarantor having net liability (or net loss) turned out almost nothing (ie. merely 3.65%). Therefore, it is interpreted that the current program was designed very safely for the interest of guarantor and has room to increase monthly payment for annuitants. We also evaluated the effect of individual variable’s volatility on the magnitude of guarantor's total risk. From the analysis, it was confirmed that the current reverse mortgage program was designed to offset longevity risk which may increase with the period mortality rate of 2013 life table by market risk which can decrease with assuming low growth rate of housing price and high level of loan rates. The concurrent simulation is viewed as a more realistic way for evaluating guarantor’s risk because it assumes key variables to change simultaneously with their interdependency in the analysis. Therefore, the concurrent simulation results could give more rational implications to the government's policy makers as well as the reverse mortgage annuity market. |
| Keywords: | Reverse Mortgage Annuity, Stochastic Process, Guarantor Risk Evaluation, Concurrent Simulation |
| JEL: | G20 G22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:2604041&r=age |