This paper analyzes the impact of aging on capital accumulation and welfare in a country with a sizable unfunded social security system. Using a two-period overlapping generation model with potentially endogenous retirement decisions, the paper shows that the type of aging, i.e. declining...

We consider an economy characterised by involuntary unemployment among low skilled workers, and investigate the implications for employment and income of welfare schemes often advocated as less distortionary. We show that reducing unemployment benefits in favour of income subsidies (social...

This paper studies how society votes on the payroll taxes of a basic income and a social health insurance scheme. Individuals differ along the two most important dimensions when it comes to the design of the two welfare schemes, namely, income and risk. Even though the introduction of a basic...

This paper analyzes the impact of demographic aging on capital accumulation and welfare in economies with unfunded pensions. Using a two-period overlapping generation model with potentially endogenous retirement decisions, it shows that both the type of aging, i.e. declining fertility or...

Does the supply of a welfare state create its own demand? Many economic scholars studying welfare arrangements refer to Say's law and insinuate a self-destructive welfare state. However, little is known about the empirical validity of these assumptions and hypotheses. We study the dynamic effect...

In this paper we estimate labor force participation responses for married women in Sweden using population-wide register data and detailed information about individuals’ budget sets. For identification we exploit a reform in the system for housing allowances in 1997 which affected...

Taxes and cash transfers reduce income inequality more in France than elsewhere in the OECD, because of the large size of the flows involved. But the system is complex overall. Its effectiveness could be enhanced in many ways, for example so as to achieve the same amount of redistribution at...