Uncertainty and its composition can affect the demand for social insurance, and thereby the labor market. This paper shows that small to medium-sized increases in uncertainty or risk aversion are enough to recommend an expansion of the safety net that would be broadly similar to the actual...

Does Social Security redistribute across cohorts? Or is it a program for purchasing the jobs' of the elderly? I formalize both models, showing how they have some predictions in common the most important of which is that generational accounts have the appearance of a pyramid scheme.' I also...