New papers from the Social Science Research Network

"Social Interactions and the Retirement Age"
Netspar Discussion Paper No. 10/2014-075

NIELS VERMEER, CPB Netherlands Bureau of Economic Policy Analysis
Email: C.A.F.Vermeer@cpb.nl
MAARTEN VAN ROOIJ, De Nederlandsche Bank, Netspar
Email: m.c.j.van.rooij@dnb.nl
DANIEL J. VAN VUUREN, CPB Netherlands Bureau of Economic Policy Analysis
Email: D.J.van.Vuuren@cpb.nl

In this study we gauge the impact of social interactions on individual retirement preferences. A survey including self-assessments and vignette questions shows that individual preferences are affected by preferences and actual retirement behavior of the social environment. Retirement from paid work depends on the retirement age of relatives, friends, colleagues and acquaintances. Information and advice provided by the social environment play a role in the retirement decision. A majority of respondents would postpone retirement when their social environment retires later. Our results indicate that a one year increase in the retirement age in an individual’s social environment is followed by an average increase of three months in the individual’s own retirement age. In addition, people show the tendency to stick more to the state pension age than to other retirement ages, which may suggest that the state pension age functions as a social norm.

"Time Inconsistency and Retirement Choice"
Netspar Discussion Paper No. 11/2014-076

T. SCOTT FINDLEY, Utah State University
Email: tscott.findley@usu.edu
FRANK CALIENDO, Utah State University
Email: frank.caliendo@usu.edu

Hyperbolic discounting with naiveté is widely believed to provide a better explanation than exponential discounting of why people borrow so much and why they wait so long to save for retirement. We reach a different set of conclusions. We show that if financial planning is enriched to include the choice of when to retire, then naive hyperbolic discounters may borrow far less and start saving for retirement significantly earlier than exponential discounters.

"Retirement Income Among American Indians and Alaska Natives in the American Community Survey"
Research and Statistics Note, No. 2015-01, February 2015

JOHN L. MURPHY, Government of the United States of America, Social Security Administration, Office of Retirement Policy
Email: john.murphy@ssa.gov

The authors present data on annual retirement income of American Indians and Alaska Natives (AIANs) from the American Community Survey and include separate analyses for AIANs of single-race and multiple-race backgrounds. The authors also compare retirement income of AIANs with that of whites and blacks and find that, overall, annual retirement income among all AIANs was significantly lower than that of whites and also of blacks.

"On the Effectiveness of Pension System in the Republic of Moldova"

ANDREI PETROIA, Economic Studies Academy of Moldova - Faculty of Finance
Email: petroia5@hotmail.com

The social security system is the main and most important social protection system. It typically covers all citizens of the Republic of Moldova, paying social security contributions and benefits. In addition, the instrument of accumulation and redistribution of financial resources is the State Social Insurance Budget – an independently budget with special status, which is part of the national budget.
This paper’s aim is to examine the efficiency of the national pension system in Moldova, identifying problems functioning of that system approached the "strong" and "weak" thereof in order to find optimal ways to improve for the system given.
The general points in this paper are: analyzing the history and the types of pensions and the existing legal and regulatory framework in the national social insurance; carrying out general feature of national pension system in Moldova; examine the situation and identifying problems in the state social insurance in Moldova; providing proposals and suggestions on improving the social security system.