The Welfare Effects of Social Insurance Reform in the Presence of Intergenerational Transfers

Abstract

Family support in the form of intergenerational transfers could serve as a substitute for the public transfer system, especially when the public safety net is weak. Intergenerational transfers could be impacted by changes in public insurance. Conversely, induced changes in family transfers could also impact the effectiveness of a public insurance program. What is the impact of social insurance reform on household welfare in the context of intergenerational transfers? This paper investigates this question by using an overlapping generations general equilibrium model where parents and their children are linked by intergenerational transfers. In the model, individuals differ in earnings ability and face idiosyncratic uninsurable income risk, health risk, and mortality risk. This paper calibrates the model to key features in the urban Chinese economy. Using this calibrated model, this paper finds that households on average experience a welfare gain from an increase in the social insurance benefits but that this effect differs across households conditional on their economic status; some households may even experience a welfare loss. This paper then provides a decomposition of these welfare changes into three channels: a direct policy channel, an intergenerational transfers channel, and a general equilibrium channel.