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Social security privatization and financial market risk : lessons from US financial history

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dc.creator Burtless, Gary
dc.date 2000
dc.date.accessioned 2013-10-16T06:58:40Z
dc.date.available 2013-10-16T06:58:40Z
dc.date.issued 2013-10-16
dc.identifier http://hdl.handle.net/10419/18181
dc.identifier ppn:314811303
dc.identifier.uri http://koha.mediu.edu.my:8181/xmlui/handle/10419/18181
dc.description A popular proposal for reforming social security is to supplement or replace traditional publicly financed benefits with a new system of mandatory defined-contribution private pensions. Proponents claim that private plans offer better returns than traditional social security. To achieve higher returns, however, contributors are exposed to extra risks associated with financial market fluctuations. This paper offers evidence on the extent of these risks by considering the hypothetical pensions U.S. workers would have obtained between 1911 and 1999 if they had accumulated retirement savings in individual accounts. The 89 hypothetical contributors are assumed to have identical careers and to contribute a fixed percentage of their wages to private investment accounts. Contributors differ only with respect to the stock market returns, bond interest rates, and price inflation they face over their careers. These differences occur because of the differing start and end dates of workers? careers. The analysis demonstrates that returns under private plans would usually have been good, but that financial market risks in a private account system are empirically quite large. Some of these risks are also present in certain types of public retirement system, but a public system has one important advantage over private pensions. Because public social security is backed by the taxing and borrowing authority of the state, it can spread risks over a much larger population of potential contributors and beneficiaries, including contributors and beneficiaries in several generations.
dc.language eng
dc.publisher Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW) Berlin
dc.relation DIW-Diskussionspapiere 211
dc.rights http://www.econstor.eu/dspace/Nutzungsbedingungen
dc.subject ddc:330
dc.subject Privaten Zusatzversorgung
dc.subject Alterssicherung
dc.subject Rente
dc.subject Altersersparnisse
dc.subject Social Security
dc.subject Private pension
dc.subject Public pension system
dc.subject Private Rentenversicherung
dc.subject Rendite
dc.subject Risiko
dc.subject Volatilität
dc.subject Gesetzliche Rentenversicherung
dc.subject Vergleich
dc.subject Vereinigte Staaten
dc.title Social security privatization and financial market risk : lessons from US financial history
dc.type doc-type:workingPaper
dc.coverage 1911-1999


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