Closing the Coverage Gap: The Role of Social Pensions and Other Retirement Income Transfers

by Noriyuki Takayama (Editor), David A. Robalino (Editor), Robert Holzmann (Editor)

Overview

In high-income countries, the percent of the population covered under mandatory old-age pension programs is typically high but often incomplete; in low- and middle-income countries, coverage is low and even stagnant. At the same time, older people are less able to rely on family and community support as a result of growing urbanization and migration. And low-income workers and the poor simply cannot save enough to prepare for their old age. As a response, many countries are considering or have already implemented various forms of retirement income transfers aiming to guarantee a minimum level of income during old age. Despite the growing popularity of these programs, research assessing their success has been limited.

'Closing the Coverage Gap: The Role of Social Pensions and Other Retirement Income Transfers' brings together a group of renowned academics, policy analysts, and policy makers working in the area of pensions and public policy. They discuss how social pensions and other retirement income transfers can be used to close the coverage gap of mandatory pension systems: how they operate, when they can be appropriate, and how to make them work. The book reviews the experiences of low-, middle-, and high-income countries with the design and implementation of retirement income transfers. The book analyzes design issues related to financing, incentives, targeting mechanisms, and administration, and also identifies the role of promising instruments such as matching contributions to reach parts of the informal sector.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780821379714
Publisher:	World Bank Publications
Publication date:	06/16/2009
Pages:	242
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.90(h) x 0.50(d)

Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments ix

Contributors xi

1 Overview and Preliminary Policy Guidance David A. Robalino Robert Holzmann 1

2 Measuring the Coverage Gap Alvaro Forteza Leonardo Lucchetti Montserrat Pallares-Miralles 23

3 Pensions and Old-Age Poverty Stephen Kidd Edward Whitehouse 41

4 Rights-Based Approach to Social Security Coverage Expansion Krzysztof Hagemejer 57

5 Social Pensions in Low-Income Countries Armando Barrientos 73

6 Social Pensions in Four Middle-Income Countries Mukul G. Asher 85

7 Social Pensions in High-Income Countries Mark Pearson Edward Whitehouse 99

8 Pension Coverage in Japan Noriyuki Takayama 111

9 The Role of Social Pensions in the Republic of Korea Hyungpyo Moon 119

10 Incentive Effects of Retirement Income Transfers John Piggott David A. Robalino Sergi Jimenez-Martin 125

11 Financing Social Pensions Alain Jousten 149

12 Defining Eligibility for Social Pensions: A View from a Social Assistance Perspective Margaret Grosh Phillippe G. Leite 161

13 Matching Defined Contributions: A Way to Increase Pension Coverage Robert Palacios David A. Robalino 187

14 Administration of Social Pension Programs Oleksiy Sluchynsky 203

Index 215

Boxes

2.1 Expansion of social security coverage for the elderly in the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, and Bolivia 37

12.1 Universalism versus targeting for social pensions 164

12.2 Proxy means tests 166

12.3 Summary of data sources, definitions, and methods 167

Figures

1.1 Taxonomy of retirement income transfers 3

1.2 Share of the elderly living with their children 5

1.3 Minimum pensions in middle- and low-income countries 9

1.4 Benefits and coverage of social pensions inmiddle- and low-income economies 11

2.1 Coverage as measured by active members of mandatory pension systems as share of labor force, worldwide, early 2000s 29

2.2 Relationship between coverage of the active population and GDP per capita, selected countries, early 2000s 29

2.3 Coverage rates of the economically active population, Latin America, 1990s and early 2000s 32

2.4 Relationship between elderly coverage and GDP per capita, selected countries, early 2000s 34

2.5 Social pensions as share of per capita GDP, early 2000s 35

2.6 Coverage rates of the elderly, Latin America and the Caribbean, 1990s and early 2000s 36

3.1 Comparison of poverty rates for national population and elderly population, OECD countries, various years (2003-06) 43

3.2 Poverty rates, nonelderly households and households with older people, selected Sub-Saharan African countries, 1998-2001 43

3.3 Old-age poverty rates and nonelderly poverty rates, controlling for the effect of pensions, Latin America and the Caribbean (2001-2005) 44

3.4 Old-age poverty rates and putative poverty rates in the absence of public pensions, OECD countries 46