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What Can Countries in Other Regions Learn from Social Security Reform in Latin America?

Autor: Gill, Indermit S.; Tatucu, Radu
Año: 2008
Resumen: About a dozen countries in Latin America have enacted reforms that include elements being contemplated elsewhere, including the partial privatization of social security. It is not easy to draw universal lessons for social security reform from the experience of countries such as Argentina, Chile, and Mexico, however, where sizeable public pension systems went bankrupt before the populations aged, mainly because of mismanagement. Most developing economies have much smaller social security systems. Relatively well-managed systems in industrial countries face problems that are long term in nature and have been brought about by an aging population. The experiences of Latin America nevertheless offer some general lessons for countries in other parts of the world. These lessons relate to changes in labor market incentives accompanying reforms and how workers react to them, government actions that have met with success in managing the transition to funded pensions, and the expectations of individuals from social security systems. Latin America's reforms suggest that the most effective approach is to keep payroll taxes low, governments solvent, and social security systems focused on providing reasonable insurance against poverty in old age.

Fuente: Banco Mundial
Clasificación: Seguridad Social y Sistemas de Pensiones
Tipo de Publicación: Documentos de Trabajo
Idioma:

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An Ex-Ante Evaluation of the Impact of Social Insurance Policies on Labor Supply in Brazil: The Case for Explicit Over Implicit Redistribution

Autor: Zylberstajn, Eduardo; Robalino, David A.; Zylberstajn, Helio; Afonso, Luis Eduardo
Año: 2008
Resumen: This paper solves and estimates a stochastic model of optimal inter-temporal behavior to assess how changes in the design of the income protection and pension systems in Brazil could affect savings rates, the share of time that individuals spend outside of the formal sector, and retirement decisions. Dynamics depend on five main parameters: preferences regarding consumption and leisure, preferences regarding formal Vs. informal work, attitudes towards risks, the rate of time preference, and the distributions of two exogenous shocks that affect movements in and out of the social security system (independently of individual decisions). The yearly household survey is used to create a pseudo panel by age-cohorts and estimate the joint distribution of model parameters based on a generalized version of the Gibbs sampler. The model does a good job in replicating the distribution of the members of the cohort across states (in or out of them social security / active or retired). Because the parameters are related to individual preferences or exogenous shocks, the joint distribution is unlikely to change when the social insurance system changes. Thus, the model is used to explore how alternative policy interventions could affect behaviors and through this channel benefit levels and fiscal costs. The results from various simulations provide three main insights: (i) the Brazilian SI system today might generate unnecessary distortions (lower savings rates, less formal employment, and more early retirement) that increase the costs of the system and might generate regressive redistribution; (ii) there are important interactions between the income protection and pension systems, which calls for joint policy analysis when considering reforms; and (iii) current distortions could be reduced by creating an actuarial link between contributions and benefits and then giving matching contributions or matching capital to individuals with limited savings capacity, which requires having individual savings accounts that can be funded or notional.

Fuente: Banco Mundial
Clasificación: Mercado Laboral
Tipo de Publicación: Documentos de Trabajo
Idioma:

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Population Aging and Economic Growth

Autor: Bloom, David E.; Canning, David; Fink, Günther
Año: 2008
Resumen: Between 2000 and 2050, the share of the population aged 60 and over is projected to increase in every country in the world. Although labor force participation rates are projected to decline from 2000 to 2040 in most countries, due mainly to changes in their age distributions, labor force- to-population ratios will actually increase in most countries. This is because low fertility will cause lower youth dependency that is more than enough to offset the skewing of adults toward the older ages at which labor force participation is lower. The increase in labor-force-to-population ratios will be further magnified by increases in age-specific rates of female labor force participation associated with fertility declines. These factors suggest that economic growth will continue apace, notwithstanding the phenomenon of population aging. For the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, the declines projected to occur in both labor force participation and labor-force-to-population ratios suggest modest declines in the pace of economic growth. But even these effects can be mitigated by behavioral responses to population aging-in the form of higher savings for retirement, greater labor force participation, and increased immigration from labor-surplus to labor-deficit countries. Countries that can facilitate such changes may be able to limit the adverse consequences of population aging. When seen through the lens of several mitigating considerations, there is reason to think that population aging in developed countries may have less effect than some have predicted. In addition, policy responses related to retirement incentives, pension funding methods, investments in health care of the elderly, and immigration can further ameliorate the effect of population aging on economic growth.

Fuente: Banco Mundial
Clasificación: Demografía
Tipo de Publicación: Documentos de Trabajo
Idioma:

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Tax and Pension Reform in the Czech Republic—Implications for Growth and Debt Sustainability

Autor: Botman, Dennis P.; Tuladhar, Anita
Año: 2008
Resumen: The Czech Republic has embarked on an ambitious tax reform and expenditure package to bring the deficit sustainably below 3 percent, and intends to reduce the deficit to 1 percent of GDP by 2012. To address the long-term fiscal challenge due to population aging, pension reform proposals are also being considered. In this paper we assess the macroeconomic effects of these measures using the Global Fiscal Model. The tax reform package will achieve a more efficient tax system. If implemented successfully with the intended expenditure savings measures, debt is projected to improve markedly while output would expand. Fiscal sustainability will not be restored, however, even if further measures to bring the deficit to 1 percent of GDP by 2012. Instead, raising the retirement age and prefunding future aging costs would be needed to keep debt below 60 percent of GDP through 2050.

Fuente: Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI)
Clasificación: Seguridad Social y Sistemas de Pensiones
Tipo de Publicación: Documentos de Trabajo
Idioma:

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Japan: Selected Issues

Autor: Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI)
Año: 2008
Resumen: This Selected Issues paper discusses the impact of global financial turmoil on Japan. It describes how close integration in global financial markets has deepened and expanded the channels for spillovers. The paper discusses options for increasing the consumption tax to finance the public pension system. It explains that while parametric reforms have reduced fiscal pressures, the basic pension is becoming a less adequate safety net for the retired. The paper also attempts to explain the declining share of labor income.

Fuente: Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI)
Clasificación: Seguridad Social y Sistemas de Pensiones
Tipo de Publicación: Informes
Idioma:

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