This paper revisits the role played by myopia in generating a theoretical rationale for pay-as-you-go social security in dynamically efficient economies. Contrary to received wisdom, if the real interest rate is exogenously fixed, enough myopia may justify public pensions but never alongside...

It has been argued that "paternalistically motivated forced savings constitutes an important, and to some the most important, rationale for social security retirement systems." This paper revisits the role played by myopia in generating a theoretical rationale for pay-as-you-go social security...

This paper revisits the role played by myopia in generating a theoretical rationale for pay-as-you-go social security in dynamically efficient economies. Contrary to received wisdom, if the real interest rate is exogenously fixed, enough myopia may justify public pensions but never alongside...

We compare two institutions head on, a family compact – a parent makes a transfer to her parent in anticipation of a possible future gift from her children – with a pay-as-you-go, social security system in a lifecycle model with endogenous fertility wherein children are valued both as...

A classic result in dynamic public economics states that there is no welfare rationale for pay-as-you-go (PAYG) pensions in a dynamically-efficient neoclassical economy with exogenous labor supply. Parenthetically, a welfare justification for PAYG pensions exists if the economy is dynamically...

We compare, head on, two intergenerational institutions, a family compact – a parent makes a transfer to her parent in anticipation of a possible future gift from her children – with a pay-as-you-go, social security system in a lifecycle model with endogenous fertility wherein children are...

We compare two institutions head on, a family compact – a parent makes a transfer to her parent in anticipation of a possible future gift from her children – with a pay-as-you-go, social security system in a lifecycle model with endogenous fertility wherein children are valued both...

Abstract. A classic result in dynamic public economics, dating back to Aaron (1966) and Samuelson (1975), states that there is no welfare rationale for PAYG pensions in a dynamically-efficient neoclassical economy with exogenous labor supply. This paper argues that this result, under the...