Retirement Income Policy in Australia

Retirement income policy in Australia has undergone
significant changes over the last two decades,
including the introduction of the Superannuation
Guarantee [SG] with mandatory contributions in 1992
and the 2007 superannuation changes with the benefit
tax abolition. Numerical implications of adopted
pension reforms and reform proposals such as further
increases in the SG contribution rate, changes to
superannuation taxation and to means-testing of the
age pension have been examined mainly by micro-
simulation models. These models, often criticized
for their lack of theoretical content, provide an
incomplete picture of pension policy effects because
of no or limited behavioural responses to the
underlying policy change. In this book, models based
on the life-cycle theory of saving pioneered by
Modigliani and Brumberg (1954) are applied to
numerically evaluate intergenerational, welfare and
macroeconomic implications of proposed changes to
Australia s retirement income policy.

Autorentext

George Kudrna did his undergraduate studies in the Czech Republic, and received a PhD in economics from the University of Sydney in 2009. He works as a research fellow for the Australian Institute for Population Ageing Research at the University of New South Wales. His research has been in the fields of pension economics and macroeconomics.

Klappentext

Retirement income policy in Australia has undergone significant changes over the last two decades, including the introduction of the Superannuation Guarantee [SG] with mandatory contributions in 1992 and the 2007 superannuation changes with the benefit tax abolition. Numerical implications of adopted pension reforms and reform proposals such as further increases in the SG contribution rate, changes to superannuation taxation and to means-testing of the age pension have been examined mainly by micro-simulation models. These models, often criticized for their lack of theoretical content, provide an incomplete picture of pension policy effects because of no or limited behavioural responses to the underlying policy change. In this book, models based on the life-cycle theory of saving pioneered by Modigliani and Brumberg (1954) are applied to numerically evaluate intergenerational, welfare and macroeconomic implications of proposed changes to Australia's retirement income policy.