Optimal Pension Systems with Simple Instruments

We analyze optimal pension systems relying on simple policy instruments in a lifecycle environment which admits endogenous decisions of how much to work as well as when to retire. The optimality in this context means the highest welfare that can be achieved within a restricted set of instruments, while keeping the total cost of the pension system unchanged. The policy instruments we consider are the optimized retirement benefit functions modeled after a stylized version of the current US Social Security.