Should Social Security Benefits Be Means Tested?
分析将全民社保改为仅向低收入或无资产者发放福利的经济状况调查制，能否减少因社保扭曲储蓄决策造成的福利损失。
Social-security retirement benefits distort the saving decisions of workers who are rational enough to save for their future. Since the implicit rate of return in an unfunded social-security program is less than the marginal product of capital, the resulting decline in saving causes a welfare loss. The present paper examines the conditions under which the welfare loss can be reduced by replacing the current universal social-security program with a means-tested program that pays benefits only to those individuals with little or no other retirement income or assets. Copyright 1987 by University of Chicago Press.