Using data from the 1997 and 2002 waves of the German Socio-Economic Panel and from official statistics, I study whether natives are less supportive of state help for the unemployed in regions where the share of foreigners among the unemployed is high. Unlike previous studies, I use...

We review the empirical literature that studies the effect of ethnic diversity on the welfare state and on individual attitudes. The outcome variables that we cover in the survey are on the one hand public spending, and on the other hand individual attitudes and behaviour, including charity...

Using data from the 1997 and 2002 waves of the German Socio-Economic Panel and from official statistics, I study whether natives are less supportive of state help for the unemployed in regions where the share of foreigners among the unemployed is high. Unlike previous studies, I use...

We ask whether a pay-as-you-go financed social security system is welfare improving in an economy with idiosyncratic productivity and aggregate business cycle risk. We show analytically that the whole welfare benefit from joint insurance against both risks is greater than the sum of benefits...

We describe the trajectory of pension reform in the United Kingdom, which has focussed on keeping the cost of public pension programmes down during a period of steady population ageing whilst attempting to maintain an adequate minimum level of income security for low income households in...

Australia’s retirement income system has several distinctive features – most notably a policy of government mandated private saving and a means-tested Age Pension – which have gained increasing international attention. This paper provides an overview of the institutional features of the...

This is a review article of three books that deal with the problems facing the U.S. Social Security system. One deals with the OASDI (Old-Age, Survivors and Disability Insurance) financial shortfall and proposes an alternative plan with both a tier one benefit and a tier two provision based on...

This paper shows that, beyond the institutional stability of Social Security, changes in the private sector as well as the emergence of a new financial paradigm have transformed both the U.S. pension system and the political debate about its future. Although no major reform of Social Security...

We review the empirical literature that studies the effect of ethnic diversity on the welfare state and on individual attitudes. The outcome variables that we cover in the survey are on the one hand public spending, and on the other hand individual attitudes and behaviour, including charity...