Social Security Programs and Retirement Around the World: Reforms and Retirement Incentives – Introduction and Summary

28 Pages Posted: 19 Nov 2018 Last revised: 28 Jan 2023

See all articles by Axel H. Börsch-Supan

Axel H. Börsch-Supan

Max Planck Society for the Advancement of the Sciences - Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA)

Courtney Coile

Wellesley College; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

Date Written: November 2018

Abstract

This is the introduction and summary to the ninth phase of an ongoing project on Social Security Programs and Retirement Around the World. This project, which compares the experiences of a dozen developed countries, was launched in the mid 1990s, following decades of decline in the labor force participation rate of older men. The first several phases of the project document that social security program provisions can create powerful incentives for retirement that are strongly correlated with the labor force behavior of older workers. Subsequent phases have explored how disability program provisions affect retirement, whether there is a link between older employment and youth unemployment, and whether older individuals are healthy enough to work longer.In the two decades since the project began, the dramatic decline in men’s labor force participation has been replaced by sharply rising participation rates. Older women’s participation has increased dramatically as well. Over this same period, countries have undertaken numerous reforms of their social security programs, disability programs, and other public benefit programs available to older workers. In this ninth phase of the project, we explore how the financial incentive to work at older ages has evolved from 1980 to the present. We highlight the important role of reforms in these changing incentives and examine how changing incentives may have affected retirement behavior.

Suggested Citation

Börsch-Supan, Axel H. and Coile, Courtney, Social Security Programs and Retirement Around the World: Reforms and Retirement Incentives – Introduction and Summary (November 2018). NBER Working Paper No. w25280, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3286945

Axel H. Börsch-Supan (Contact Author)

Max Planck Society for the Advancement of the Sciences - Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA) ( email )

Amalienstrasse 33
Munich, 80799
Germany

HOME PAGE: http://www.mea.mpisoc.mpg.de

Courtney Coile

Wellesley College ( email )

106 Central Street
Wellesley, MA 02181
United States
781-283-2408 (Phone)
781-283-2177 (Fax)

National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

1050 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02138
United States

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
118
Abstract Views
738
Rank
425,167
PlumX Metrics