Public and Welfare

Coping with the ageing of the population without major economic disruption is undoubtedly one of the major challenges facing the global economy and world financial markets both now and for the coming decades. In this context, this book assesses the major economic issues raised by occupational pension funds, as they have arisen in twelve OECD countries — the US, the UK, Germany, Japan, France, Italy, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, as well as in Chile and Singapore. Particular emphasis is placed on the performance of funds in financial markets, the influence on funds of fiscal and regulatory conditions, and the consequences of funds' development for capital markets, corporate finance, and international investment. The relationship with social security, the comparative advantages of defined benefit and defined contribution funds, and the role of funds in developing countries are also examined in detail.

The ruling class plays a major role in our societies. It makes possible what would otherwise be infeasible, by shifting out those constraints that stand in the way of long-term growth. Historically, economists devoted far less attention than sociologists to the study of ruling classes. Using the theoretical tools of economists, this book provides an understanding of what drives the formation of a ruling class, and the relationship between politics and business firms. Focusing on Italy, it uses labour economics to analyse the selection of the ruling class, the labour market of politicians, the allocation of managers' time, and their incentives, remunerations, and career paths. It draws on contributions from two teams of leading scholars and on research undertaken by the Fondazione Rodolfo DeBenedetti. Part I focuses on the labour market of politicians. It uses detailed information on personal characteristics, incomes, performance in office, and career paths (before, as well as after, the Parliamentary mandate) of all the politicians elected to the Italian Lower Chamber (Camera) between 1948 and 2008. Part II is devoted to the managerial class. It includes cross-country surveys of managers across a sample of European countries, surveys carried out in cooperation with the largest union of managers in the service sector, social security records, and, for the first time, surveys on the allocation of time of top executives.

Social security systems are being reviewed and changed in many countries around the world. This book considers some of the key policy issues for design of a social security reform, as well as reviewing much of the academic literature on the positive and normative aspects of social security. The first chapter provides an examination of key policy issues of general concern includes the funding of social security, the comparison of defined benefit and defined contribution systems, notional defined contribution accounts, alternative approaches to organizing individual defined contribution accounts, and the provision of survivor benefits. The book then turns to the academic literature on the interactions between social security and the labor and capital markets, providing a non-technical overview of the existing literature and pointing-out gaps in current research findings. The second chapter reviews the impact on retirement decisions of forced savings, the use of an earnings or retirement test, mandated annuitization, recognizing heterogeneity in both life expectancy and possibly in risk classification for annuity pricing, and treatment of the family, particularly the use of joint-life annuitization. Also reviewed is the impact on labor supply at younger ages, considering mandatory savings and annuitization, contrasting defined benefit and defined contribution systems, and analysing alternative approaches to redistribution within social security. The final chapter covers issues of aggregate capital accumulation and risk-sharing, with the latter including the risks in annuitization, in the returns to capital, and in aggregate earnings. Also considered are the risks in the political process.