Europe's Looming Pension Divide (with Hubert Beyerle)

The German version named "Europas künftige Rentenkluft" was published in Wirtschaftsdienst vol. 94 (5), pages 364-368, May 2014 (editor [not peer] reviewed).

Keywords: Demography, retirement age, cross-country comparison

Download: English version January 2014 , also available as IMK Policy Brief 1/2014.

Abstract: There is a significant variation in demographic development between different European Union (EU) member states. Using the UN's Population Prospects, we examine how different retirement ages in selected EU countries would lead to comparable relations between the working-age population and pensioners in the future. In the coming decades it seems that the French would be able to take retirement roughly four years earlier than Germans. There is, therefore, no apparent economic justification for the suggested alignment of retirement ages in accordance with the current German regulation, as is sometimes suggested. Even the EU Commission has prioritised life expectancy in its recommendations for greater sustainability in the pension system, despite the fact that it is an insufficient indicator.

(Latest update: October 2017)