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The Netherlands has a relatively generous social security system and a wide coverage of individuals by private (occupational) pension schemes. Total household savings are rather high and fairly stable, although the amount of contractual... more
The Netherlands has a relatively generous social security system and a wide coverage of individuals by private (occupational) pension schemes. Total household savings are rather high and fairly stable, although the amount of contractual savings apears to be going up at the expense of non-contractual (‘free’) savings. Using an approach originally pioneered by Feldstein (1974) we employ microdata to investigate the displacement effect of security and pension wealth on free household savings. It turns out that the data available are too noisy to make precise statements about the displacement effects. Our results do suggest, however, that a one-for-one displacement of free savings by social security is consistent with the data. For pensions such a complete offset is less likely. This suggests that increase of coverage by private pensions is an effective way of raising savings.
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Research Interests: Health Economics, Pain, Health, Employment, Medicine, and 13 moreApplied Economics, Humans, United States, Female, Male, Aged, Middle Aged, Dynamic Panel Data, Public health systems and services research, Health and Retirement Study, Statistical models, Music Information Dynamics, and Disabled Persons
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ABSTRACTWe formulate a stylized structural model of health, wealth accumulation and retirement decisions building on the human capital framework of health and derive analytic solutions for the time paths of consumption, health, health... more
ABSTRACTWe formulate a stylized structural model of health, wealth accumulation and retirement decisions building on the human capital framework of health and derive analytic solutions for the time paths of consumption, health, health investment, savings and retirement. We argue that the literature has been unnecessarily restrictive in assuming that health is always at the ‘optimal’ health level. Exploring the properties of corner solutions, we find that advances in population health decrease the retirement age, whereas at the same time, individuals retire when their health has deteriorated. This potentially explains why retirees point to deteriorating health as an important reason for early retirement, whereas retirement ages have continued to fall in the developed world, despite continued improvements in population health and mortality. In our model, workers with higher human capital invest more in health and, because they stay healthier, retire later than those with lower human c...
Research Interests: Economics, Health Economics, Human Capital, Health, Employment, and 15 moreMedicine, Production economics, Humans, Retirement, Female, Male, Health Status, Aged, Middle Aged, Theoretical Models, Age Factors, Health Care Costs, Overlapping Generations Model, consumption sociology, and Medical and Health Sciences
Research Interests: Chemistry, Economics, Time Series, Catalysis, Economic Theory, and 13 moreProductivity, European Economic Integration, World War II, Labour Economics, Social Security, Panel Data, Generosity, Labor Market, Cross Section, Life Cycle Model, Productivity Growth, Per Capita Income, and Gross National Product
This article provides evidence about the quality of retrospective childhood health histories given to respondents in the Health and Retirement Survey (HRS) and the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). Even though information on early... more
This article provides evidence about the quality of retrospective childhood health histories given to respondents in the Health and Retirement Survey (HRS) and the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). Even though information on early life health events is critical, there is legitimate skepticism about the ability of older respondents to remember specific health problems that they had during childhood. The evidence presented in this article suggests that this view is too negative. Respondents appear to remember salient childhood events about themselves, such as the illnesses they had during childhood, quite well. Moreover, these physical and psychological childhood health events are important correlates of adult health during middle age.
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Although aging is a global phenomenon, there are large differences across countries in both the speed of aging and the current age composition. Furthermore, countries adopt vastly different policies. This creates a natural laboratory that... more
Although aging is a global phenomenon, there are large differences across countries in both the speed of aging and the current age composition. Furthermore, countries adopt vastly different policies. This creates a natural laboratory that scientists can use to understand how policies affect outcomes. I discuss under what circumstances data from different countries can be used for inference about policy effects. Although comparable health and retirement data are currently being collected in some 25 countries, the use of such data requires careful modeling of differences in institutions and in response styles across countries.
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ABSTRACT