IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/arx/papers/2404.10090.html

Intergenerational Insurance

Author

Listed:
  • Francesco Lancia
  • Alessia Russo
  • Tim Worrall

Abstract

How should successive generations insure each other when the young can default on previously promised transfers to the old? This paper studies intergenerational insurance that maximizes the expected discounted utility of all generations subject to participation constraints for each generation. If complete insurance is unattainable, the optimal intergenerational insurance is history-dependent even when the environment is stationary. The risk from a generational shock is spread into the future, with periodic resetting. Interpreting intergenerational insurance in terms of debt, the fiscal reaction function is nonlinear and the risk premium on debt is lower than the risk premium with complete insurance.

Suggested Citation

  • Francesco Lancia & Alessia Russo & Tim Worrall, 2024. "Intergenerational Insurance," Papers 2404.10090, arXiv.org.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2404.10090
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://arxiv.org/pdf/2404.10090
    File Function: Latest version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Greg Kaplan & Giovanni L. Violante, 2010. "How Much Consumption Insurance beyond Self-Insurance?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(4), pages 53-87, October.
    2. Zheng Song & Kjetil Storesletten & Yikai Wang & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2015. "Sharing High Growth across Generations: Pensions and Demographic Transition in China," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(2), pages 1-39, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lancia, Francesco & Russo, Alessia & Worrall, Tim S, 2020. "Optimal Sustainable Intergenerational Insurance," CEPR Discussion Papers 15540, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Jingjing Xu, 2024. "Intergenerational transfers in China: What are the patterns of the transfers and when do the transfers occur?," International Studies of Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 19(1), pages 117-150, March.
    3. Serdar Ozkan & Kurt Mitman & Fatih Karahan & Aaron Hedlund, 2016. "Monetary Policy, Heterogeneity and the Housing Channel," 2016 Meeting Papers 663, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    4. Oliwia Komada & Krzysztof Makarski & Joanna Tyrowicz, 2017. "Welfare effects of fiscal policy in reforming the pension system," GRAPE Working Papers 11, GRAPE Group for Research in Applied Economics.
    5. Zhao, Weimin & Chen, Na, 2024. "Does old-age security promote rural residents' consumption? A decomposition based on contribution and replacement rates," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 817-830.
    6. Richard Blundell & Luigi Pistaferri & Itay Saporta-Eksten, 2016. "Consumption Inequality and Family Labor Supply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(2), pages 387-435, February.
    7. Anping Chen & Nicolaas Groenewold, 2017. "An increase in the retirement age in China: the regional economic effects," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(7), pages 702-721, February.
    8. Arpita Chatterjee & James Morley & Aarti Singh, 2021. "Estimating household consumption insurance," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(5), pages 628-635, August.
    9. Jane Golley & Rod Tyers & Yixiao Zhou, 2018. "Fertility and savings contractions in China: Long‐run global implications," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(11), pages 3194-3220, November.
    10. Andrés Erosa & Luisa Fuster & Gueorgui Kambourov, 2016. "Towards a Micro-Founded Theory of Aggregate Labour Supply," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(3), pages 1001-1039.
    11. Bellofatto, Antonio Andrés, 2025. "Wealth taxation and life expectancy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    12. Terézia Vančová, 2019. "The Excess Smoothness and Sensitivity of Consumption in the V4 Countries," Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, Mendel University Press, vol. 67(6), pages 1653-1663.
    13. Giulio Fella & Serafin Frache & Winfried Koeniger, 2020. "Buffer‐Stock Saving And Households' Response To Income Shocks," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1359-1382, August.
    14. Michael Dotsey, 2019. "Demographic Aging, Industrial Policy, and Chinese Economic Growth," 2019 Meeting Papers 640, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    15. Eva De Francisco, 2019. "Housing Choices and Their Implications for Consumption Heterogeneity," International Finance Discussion Papers 1249, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    16. Corina Boar & Denis Gorea & Virgiliu Midrigan, 2022. "Liquidity Constraints in the U.S. Housing Market," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 89(3), pages 1120-1154.
    17. Kaiji Chen & Yi Wen, 2017. "The Great Housing Boom of China," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(2), pages 73-114, April.
    18. Maksym Bryukhanov & Dmytro Hryshko, 2024. "Inequality in Russia over time and over the life cycle," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 126(2), pages 289-319, April.
    19. Swapnil Singh, 2018. "Public insurance of married versus single households in the US: trends and welfare consequences," Bank of Lithuania Working Paper Series 54, Bank of Lithuania.
    20. Phitawat Poonpolkul & Ponpoje Porapakkarm & Nada Wasi, 2024. "Aging, inadequacy, and fiscal constraint: The case of Thailand," International Studies of Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 19(1), pages 35-67, March.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:arx:papers:2404.10090. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: arXiv administrators (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://arxiv.org/ .

    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.