IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/qjecon/v100y1985i3p789-806..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Distribution of Wealth and Welfare in the Presence of Incomplete Annuity Markets

Author

Listed:
  • Zvi Eckstein
  • Martin S. Eichenbaum
  • Dan Peled

Abstract

This paper examines the implications of the absence of complete annuity markets on the distribution of wealth and welfare of agents whose saving decisions are obtained under uncertainty regarding the length of their life. The absence of annuities is shown to yield a unique nondegenerate intragenerational distribution of wealth, which is fully characterized. This characterization is then used to evaluate the Pareto desirability of an annuity system. Alternative welfare criteria that can be used when the proposed change has differential impacts on the initial state of subsequent generations are considered.

Suggested Citation

  • Zvi Eckstein & Martin S. Eichenbaum & Dan Peled, 1985. "The Distribution of Wealth and Welfare in the Presence of Incomplete Annuity Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 100(3), pages 789-806.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:qjecon:v:100:y:1985:i:3:p:789-806.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.2307/1884379
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Luisa Fuster, 2000. "Capital Accumulation in an Economy with Dynasties and Uncertain Lifetimes," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 3(4), pages 650-674, October.
    2. David C. Webb, 2009. "Asymmetric Information, Long‐Term Care Insurance, and Annuities: The Case for Bundled Contracts," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 76(1), pages 53-85, March.
    3. Andrew B. Abel, "undated". "The Implications of Insurance for the Efficacy of Fiscal Policy," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 6-88, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    4. Sanchez-Romero, Miguel, 2006. "“Demand for Private Annuities and Social Security: Consequences to Individual Wealth”," Working Papers in Economic Theory 2006/07, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain), Department of Economic Analysis (Economic Theory and Economic History).
    5. Abel, Andrew B, 1986. "Capital Accumulation and Uncertain Lifetimes with Adverse Selection," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(5), pages 1079-1097, September.
    6. Tomer Blumkin & Efraim Sadka, 2001. "Estate Taxation," CESifo Working Paper Series 558, CESifo.
    7. Torben M. Andersen & Marias H. Gestsson, 2021. "Annuitization and aggregate mortality risk," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 88(1), pages 79-99, March.
    8. Dutta, Jayasri & Michel, Philippe, 1998. "The Distribution of Wealth with Imperfect Altruism," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 82(2), pages 379-404, October.
    9. Laurence J. Kotlikoff & John B. Shoven & Avia Spivak, 1984. "The Impact of Annuity Insurance on Savings and Inequality," NBER Working Papers 1403, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Laps, Jochen, 2016. "Fully Funded Social Security Pensions, Lifetime Risk and Income," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145587, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    11. Feldstein, Martin, 1988. "The Effects of Fiscal Policies when Incomes Are Uncertain: A Contradiction to Ricardian Equivalence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(1), pages 14-23, March.
    12. Cukierman, Alex, 1986. "Uncertain Lifetimes and the Ricardian Equivalence Proposition," Foerder Institute for Economic Research Working Papers 275423, Tel-Aviv University > Foerder Institute for Economic Research.
    13. Eichenbaum, Martin S & Peled, Dan, 1987. "Capital Accumulation and Annuities in an Adverse Selection Economy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 95(2), pages 334-354, April.
    14. Pecchenino, Rowena A & Pollard, Patricia S, 1997. "The Effects of Annuities, Bequests, and Aging in an Overlapping Generations Model of Endogenous Growth," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(440), pages 26-46, January.
    15. Frank Caliendo & Nick Guo & Roozbeh Hosseini, 2014. "Social Security is NOT a Substitute for Annuity Markets," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(4), pages 739-755, October.
    16. Torben M. Andersen & Marias H. Gestsson, 2022. "Is full annuitization socially optimal?," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 135(2), pages 199-217, March.
    17. Blumkin, Tomer & Sadka, Efraim, 2004. "Estate taxation with intended and accidental bequests," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1-2), pages 1-21, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:qjecon:v:100:y:1985:i:3:p:789-806.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/qje .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.