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The Roots of Public Pensions Provision: Social Insurance and the Beveridge Plan

Jose Harris

in Britain's Pensions Crisis: History and Policy

William Beveridge and his Report on Social Insurance and Allied Services of 1942 continue to occupy a pivotal position in the history of social security provision not only in Britain and Europe but ... More

William Beveridge and his Report on Social Insurance and Allied Services of 1942 continue to occupy a pivotal position in the history of social security provision not only in Britain and Europe but also in the wider world into the twenty-first century. This chapter examines why the Beveridge Plan and its ideas were so popular and seemingly so authoritative. Although Beveridge's long public career in social policy had been mainly concerned with the quite different sphere of unemployment insurance, his ideas about old-age pensions did not spring from nowhere in 1941, but dated back to the year 1907. In 1908, he became a personal adviser to Winston Churchill at the Board of Trade, where he was instrumental in inserting many of his ideas about social insurance into the unemployment provisions of the National Insurance Act of 1911. At the time of his appointment as chairman of the Social Insurance Committee in June 1941, Beveridge had almost no specialist knowledge of pensions administration or pensions finance.Less

Coda

Karen Chase

in The Victorians and Old Age

This brief afterward glances at the growing prominence of the elderly by the century's end, and connects it to the increase in visibility brought about by reforms in institutional care, the passing ... More

This brief afterward glances at the growing prominence of the elderly by the century's end, and connects it to the increase in visibility brought about by reforms in institutional care, the passing of an Old Age Pensions Bill, the maturing of gerontology as a medical discipline, the increasing awareness of a generational divide, and not the least, by the narratives, journalism and portraits of aging which it has been the task and the pleasure of this book to analyze.Less

The Politics and Personality of Age at the Fin de Siècle

Karen Chase

in The Victorians and Old Age

A look at Morris's News From Nowhere complements the earlier analysis of Wilde and demonstrates an alternative aesthetic of aging. Morris imagines the transformation of the aging body as an index of ... More

A look at Morris's News From Nowhere complements the earlier analysis of Wilde and demonstrates an alternative aesthetic of aging. Morris imagines the transformation of the aging body as an index of social justice. From Morris's utopic fiction the account moves to the efforts of social scientists and political reformers to produce systematic change. Consideration of the passage of an Old Age Pension Bill leads to analysis of the work and lives of Charles Booth and Beatrice Webb, whose statistical surveys and descriptions dominated the discourse of aging in the last decade of the century. Webb's friendship with Herbert Spencer, and Spencer's protracted period of aging become of particular relevance as one moves from the defense of sociological ‘portraiture’ to the individual experience of old age.Less

Trends in Employment and Social Security Incentives in the Spanish Pension System, 1980–2016

Pilar García-Gómez, Sílvia Garcia-Mandicó, Sergi Jiménez-Martín, and Judit Vall-Castelló

in Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: Reforms and Retirement Incentives

In this chapter, we analyze the association between financial incentives and retirement decisions using aggregate data over four decades in Spain. We first compute expected social security benefits ... More

In this chapter, we analyze the association between financial incentives and retirement decisions using aggregate data over four decades in Spain. We first compute expected social security benefits from each possible retirement pathway at ages 55 to 69 for a representative worker for each cohort falling in this age range in our observational period. We allow representative workers to differ by marital status, gender, and earnings level. We calculate an implicit tax rate on employment, a measure that weights the gains and losses from working one additional year for each representative worker, and we examine its correlation with employment rates for older workers. The results suggest that financial incentives play a role in explaining the retirement patterns of both employed and unemployed workers.Less

Social security policy

Chak Kwan Chan, King Lun Ngok, and David Phillips

in Social policy in China: Development and well-being

This chapter explains the welfare functions of communes and work units before China's economic reforms. It also describes the new social security measures which came about after 1978 such as old age ... More

This chapter explains the welfare functions of communes and work units before China's economic reforms. It also describes the new social security measures which came about after 1978 such as old age pensions in cities and the countryside, the Minimum Standard of Living Scheme, and the Five Guarantees. Moreover, the impact of China's social security reforms on the well-being of welfare recipients in the context of the modified human dignity framework is addressed. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has nearly completely destroyed its core value of equality. The new social security system is biased towards both urban areas and people engaged in the labour market. It should be stressed that China has made remarkable progress in terms of poverty reduction.Less

Reforming Pensions

Anders Åslund and Simeon Djankov

in Europe's Growth Challenge

Europe is aging rapidly, and the old need pensions and care. As a share of the active population aged 15−64, the European population aged 65 or above is projected to increase from 28 percent in 2016 ... More

Europe is aging rapidly, and the old need pensions and care. As a share of the active population aged 15−64, the European population aged 65 or above is projected to increase from 28 percent in 2016 to 53 percent in 2060. Consequently, an increasing share of national income will cover pension expenditures. In 2013, old-age pensions accounted for an average of 9.2 percent of GDP in the EU-28, to compare with 6.1 percent of GDP in the United States. European pension systems vary greatly, but they appear to be converging. Early pension schemes are reined in. Retirement ages are set to rise with longer life expectancy. The Dutch pension system appears the best. Comprehensive pension reform would aim at a three-pillar system with a minimum public pension guaranteed to all, a second pillar of a pension based on mandatory private savings, and a third pillar of voluntary private savings.Less

Public Opinion in South and Nation

Devin Caughey

in The Unsolid South

This chapter examines the political attitudes of the Southern mass public in the wake of the Great Depression and the New Deal. Taking advantage of hundreds of public opinion polls conducted ... More

This chapter examines the political attitudes of the Southern mass public in the wake of the Great Depression and the New Deal. Taking advantage of hundreds of public opinion polls conducted beginning in the mid-1930s, the chapter documents Southern whites' collective turn against many aspects of the New Deal as well as their persistent ideological diversity on economic issues. The chapter illustrates these developments with a focus on four policy areas: old-age pensions, minimum wages, union security agreements, and income taxation. It then summarizes these patterns using a dynamic group-level item response theory (IRT) model, which estimates the economic conservatism of demographic subpopulations in each state and year. Based on this and other evidence, the chapter argues that the South's turn to the right was driven partly by the increasingly urban and union-oriented character of New Deal liberalism, which alienated rural areas throughout the nation, and partly by white Southerners' growing sense of threat to their region's system of racial hierarchy.Less

Old Age Pensions

Richard B. Collins, Dale A. Oesterle, and Lawrence Friedman

in The Colorado State Constitution

This chapter assesses Article XXIV of the Colorado Constitution, which provides for old age pensions. A 1936 citizens’ initiative added the article to set up the Old Age Pension Fund in the state ... More

This chapter assesses Article XXIV of the Colorado Constitution, which provides for old age pensions. A 1936 citizens’ initiative added the article to set up the Old Age Pension Fund in the state treasury and entitle the fund to specified revenues. A 1956 initiative amended the article to raise pension revenues, increase pensions, and add a health and medical care fund. It also allows surplus revenue to be used for other purposes. Section 3 sets qualifications for entitlement to a pension. Litigation and statutes have changed eligibility rules over time. Section 6 defines pension amounts, reduced by other retirement or pension income. In practice, because of availability of other pensions, the system has operated with surpluses paid into the general fund.Less

Policy-Authorizing Amendments

John Dinan

in State Constitutional Politics: Governing by Amendment in the American States

This chapter, the second of three chapters analyzing policy-related state constitutional amendments, examines amendments that authorize passage of public policies. The chapter chronicles the range of ... More

This chapter, the second of three chapters analyzing policy-related state constitutional amendments, examines amendments that authorize passage of public policies. The chapter chronicles the range of policy-authorizing amendments and explains why these kinds of amendments have been so prevalent, especially from the late-nineteenth century onward. Amendments have authorized passage of labor laws regulating the hours, wages, and conditions of workers, with the intent of overturning or preempting contrary state court decisions. Other amendments have authorized social-insurance programs such as mothers’ pensions and old-age pensions, sometimes in the face of contrary state court rulings and sometimes in order to overcome explicit constitutional limits. Still other amendments have authorized certain taxes (especially income taxes) or tax exemptions (often property-tax exemptions), empowered state governments to incur debt, and permitted lotteries and various other forms of gambling, generally as a way of overcoming constitutional barriers to taxing, borrowing, and gaming.Less

Social Security Schemes in Tribal Areas of Gujarat: A Study in the Dangs District

K.P. Kannan and Jan Breman

in The Long Road to Social Security: Assessing the Implementation of National Social Security Initiatives for the Working Poor in India

India introduced many social security schemes for unorganised workers, including the National Rural Employment Guarantee (NREG), a social health insurance scheme known as Rashtriya Swasthya Bima ... More

India introduced many social security schemes for unorganised workers, including the National Rural Employment Guarantee (NREG), a social health insurance scheme known as Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY), old age pension, and widow pension. This chapter examines these schemes and their implementation in the tribal areas of Gujarat in general and the Dangs district in particular, and the extent to which they have benefited tribes in four villages: Borigavtha, Koshimda, Linga, and Chokia. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), implemented in February 2006 in Dangs, sought to reduce migration and improve the quality of life of the people through employment. The RSBY, an important health insurance scheme for rural poor, was intended to improve the health standard of Dangs residents, especially those who are below the poverty line.Less

Labor, Capital, and Human Rights

Beverly Moran

in Tax, Inequality, and Human Rights

This chapter discusses how the US tax code—like many Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country tax codes—favors capital over labor, and thereby is at odds with fundamental ... More

This chapter discusses how the US tax code—like many Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country tax codes—favors capital over labor, and thereby is at odds with fundamental tenets of human rights and policy principles regarding equity. This bias in favor of capital may not only be counterproductive in terms of its impacts on revenue generation and tax administration. It also entrenches inequalities and disregards the ways in which the human body, with its labor capacity, is the most essential “asset” on which most people rely. Therefore, labor should enjoy the preferences, such as the realization principle and depreciation, from which capital currently benefits. The chapter then outlines a course of investigation for further study including contrasting Social Security old-age pension and disability benefits, and exploring the consequences of shifting property to accrual accounting while providing the human body with generous depreciation deductions and tax deferral through realization.Less

The Clitheroe By-election

in The Lancashire Giant: David Shackleton, Labour Leader and Civil Servant

This chapter examines the preparation of David Shackleton for the Clitheroe by-election to replace Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth who was elevated to the House of Lords. It suggests that the selection of ... More

This chapter examines the preparation of David Shackleton for the Clitheroe by-election to replace Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth who was elevated to the House of Lords. It suggests that the selection of Shackleton was motivated by the Independent Labour Party (ILP) in Parliament and discusses his election address where he expressed his intention to address Taff Vale and anti-picketing judgments and work on workers' compensation, old-age pensions, and eight-hour legislation. This chapter also describes the preparation made for the election by the Liberal and Socialist parties.Less