Political Viability of Public Pensions and Education. An Empirical Application

Abstract

Public intergenerational transfers (IGTs) may emerge from the failure of private arrangements to provide optimal economic resources for the young and old. We investigate the political sustainability of the public system of IGTs by seeking to determine the outcome if the decision to reallocate economic resources per se was put to the vote. Exploiting the particular nature of the data from the National Transfer Accounts data in a political economy application in which generations cooperate under certain conditions, we show that most of the developed countries would vote in favour of a joint public education and pension system.

Keywords: Intergenerational transfers, population ageing, pay-as-you-go financing, National Transfer Accounts, political economy

JEL Classification: D70, H50, J10, P16