| The increasing life expectancy and declining birth rate have led to an increasingly serious problem of population aging,which poses a serious challenge to the sustainability of China’s social pension funds.In the context of China’s imperfect social security system,increasing the contribution rate and lowering the pension replacement rate will lead to a reduction in people’s welfare and cannot be implemented.Given that the current retirement age is not in line with the development trend of population aging,doesn’t match the life expectancy per capita,does not adapt to the structural changes in the labor force,and is not conducive to the full utilization of human capital,delaying the retirement age has become an inevitable choice.With the aim of exploring the optimal design for delayed retirement,using the increasing of the sustainability of social pension funds and improving people’s well-being as the judging criteria,and with the equilibrium conditions of households’ utility maximization,firms’ profit maximization and government’s budget balance of social pension funds at the same time,based on the life-cycle theory,we explore the effects of normal retirement,autonomous delayed retirement,passive delayed retirement,and differential retirement for heterogeneous populations under the framework of the two-period overlapping generations model(OLG).Further,we analyze the effects of life expectancy,birth rate,labor productivity and contribution rate on the effects of the delayed retirement policy,with a view to providing a theoretical basis and several suggestions for the optimal design of the upcoming delayed retirement policy scheme in China.This dissertation first establishes a two-period OLG model to argue for the necessity of delaying the retirement age.In the first period,representative individuals work and contribute to a pension fund,and the after-tax wage income they earn is used for consumption,childcare expenses,and saving for the second period.In the second period,individuals face three choices: voluntary delayed retirement,passive delayed retirement,and normal retirement,and spend all their income on consumption in later life.In equilibrium conditions,we quantify the policy effects of each retirement policy by calibrating for parameters and solving them numerically.We found that under autonomous delayed retirement,people have the highest steady-state pension amount,the highest steadystate utility,and the highest steady-state consumption,and therefore the greatest improvement in the sustainability of the social pension fund and in the welfare of the delayed retirees,followed by passive delayed retirement and the worst normal retirement,which suggests that the implementation of a delayed retirement program is necessary.The dissertation further analyzes the effects of four factors: life expectancy,birth rate,labor productivity and contribution rate on the effects of automatous delayed retirement policies.We find that increases in life expectancy and labor productivity further enhance both the sustainability of social pension funds and the welfare improvement effect of delayed retirees under an autonomous delayed retirement policy,and that increases in the birth rate enhance this sustainability,but at the same time weaken the welfare effect of individuals.Thus,the sustainability effect is superimposed and enhanced when any two or three of life expectancy,birth rate,and labor productivity act together;the welfare effect is superimposed and enhanced when life expectancy and labor productivity act together,and this welfare effect is superimposed and weakened when birth rate is also considered.Therefore,the government should develop a series of supporting measures to increase the fertility rate,while improving childcare subsidies,childcare services,and increasing labor productivity of the elderly,in order to reduce the resistance during the implementation of delayed retirement policy.This dissertation also addresses the design of a differentiated retirement program for older adults with heterogeneous characteristics.We first develop a comparative advantage model to further argue that delayed retirement for the elderly is indeed necessary.Then,we empirically argue that the heterogeneous way to delayed retirement derived from the theoretical model does exist using Urban Household Survey(UHS)data and find that education level,industry,skill type,and marital status are all important factors that influence whether older people are willing to delay retirement,which illustrates that we need to implement differential retirement policies for older adults based on their education level,marital status,industry,and other characteristics in the actual policy making process.Further,using labor productivity as a bridge,a quantitative distinction is given between those who are suitable for normal retirement and those who are suitable for delayed retirement,respectively,under the PAYG(Pay as you go),Full-funded(FF)systems and without considering social security,i.e.,the critical labor productivity is obtained by comparing the magnitude of utility when an individual chooses delayed retirement with that when he or she chooses normal retirement.People with labor productivity at and above the threshold will continue to work,otherwise they will retire normally.At last,by giving those who are eligible for delayed retirement the opportunity to freely choose the time they want to delay,and through income redistribution,a portion of the social pension fund balance gained and the increase in social wealth created under the delayed retirement policy is subsidized to all people,so that all people can enjoy the spillover benefits from this policy.At the same time,to reduce inequality and motivate the delayed retirees to work further.In the meantime,granting tax exemptions,subsidies,and other benefits to eligible older adults is necessary to motivate them to work longer. |
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