Looks at the policy choices involved in creating pension schemes, particularly whether it is advisable to move away from government pay-as-you-go pensions toward private or publicly funded plans. Examines the reasons for the controversy surrounding pension design, and whether the second level of...

This article, based on two books (Barr and Diamond 2008, forthcoming), sets out a series of principles for pension design rooted in economic theory: pension systems have multiple objectives, analysis should consider the pension system as a whole, analysis should be framed in a second-best...

This paper discusses the building blocks of pension reform in the light of economic theory, and their application to different types of economy. The opening section sets out the simple economics of pensions. The second section discusses a series of myths which have proved remarkably persistent....