This paper assesses the effect of social security privatization on the government budget, economic efficiency, national savings, and the distribution of resources across generations. It is shown that the benefits of privatization most often touted by privatization advocates can be achieved by...

This paper assesses the effect of social security privatization on the government budget, economic efficiency, national saving, and the distribution of resources across generations. It is shown that the benefits of privatization most often touted by privatization advocates can be achieved by...

Being fair to future generations requires that Social Security be reformed in a manner that prefunds a significant share of future Social Security benefit payments. All serious reform plans have this property. Prefunding is done exclusively in the Social Security trust fund in some plans, and it...