Means Testing Retirement Benefits: Fostering Equity or Discouraging Savings?
用动态规划模型分析英国养老金改革，发现降低经济状况调查的边际税率会鼓励最穷的三分之一家庭多储蓄并延迟退休，但对较富裕家庭有相反效果。
Means testing plays an important role in the UK state pension system. We use a dynamic programming model to consider the effects of a recent policy reform that reduced the marginal tax rates on private income of means tested retirement benefits from 100% to 40%. Our analysis suggests that the policy reform will encourage the poorest third of all households to both save more and delay retirement, and have the opposite effects on richer households. The policy reform provides a reasonable compromise between the distortions associated with high marginal tax rates and the costs of universal benefits provision. Copyright © 2008 The Author(s).