Skuteczność i efektywność systemu emerytalnego: koncepcja analizy i próba pomiaru

This paper concerns issues relating to the effectiveness and efficiency of old-age pension system, these being matters very rarely addressed in either the Polish or foreign literature. Taking as a starting point considerations of effectiveness and efficiency in economics, definitions are proposed for the effectiveness and efficiency of a pension system, their determinants and interdependencies are described, and issues relating to their measurement are presented. The old-age pension system is defined broadly, as a tool for the allocation of income over the life cycle so as to provide for income (and consequently consumption) in the period of old age. The effectiveness of the pension system is defined here as a feature characterizing the degree to which it achieves its basic purpose - the income objective. The efficiency of the system is defined as a feature characterizing the level of the system's financial stability and security, profitability, costliness, and effect on the economy. The effectiveness and efficiency of the pension system are treated in this work as multidimensional features. The dimensions of effectiveness are poverty among pensioners, pensioner incomes, and differentiation in poverty and income between pensioners of different sexes. The dimensions of efficiency, on the other hand, are economic balance, investment performance, cost-effectiveness and effect on the labour market. The methodological section of the paper focuses primarily on the author's proposal for a procedure to measure the effectiveness and efficiency of pension systems using a tool of multidimensional comparative analysis, namely linear ordering with a synthetic measure. Proposed sets of indicators of effectiveness and indicators of efficiency are proposed, as well as methodology for selecting them based on statistical criteria and a methodology of aggregation, firstly into group indicators representing particular dimensions of effectiveness and efficiency, and then into overall synthetic indicators of effectiveness and efficiency. The empirical part of the work contains measurements of the effectiveness and efficiency of the pension systems in 30 European countries, an evaluation of the quality that measurement and an analysis of interdependencies between a system's effectiveness and efficiency. Measurements and evaluation are also made of the studied features in different pension system types, using two typologies - the first based on the criterion of relations between the state and the market in providing pensions, and the second on the criterion of the degree of redistribution within generations in the pension system. The thesis and hypotheses verified in this work led to the formulation of the following main conclusions: - A multidimensional approach to evaluating the effectiveness and efficiency of old-age pension systems is entirely correct and necessary in order to make a comprehensive evaluation of them. To treat these two categories as single-dimensional features is an extreme simplification and may lead to erroneous conclusions. - The method of linear ordering with a synthetic measure, based above all on substantial criteria for the selection of appropriate diagnostic indicators, is a good tool for relative evaluation of the effectiveness and efficiency of pension systems. - Different pension system types can be effective in a multidimensional sense. The role of the state or the level of redistribution within generations are not therefore determinants of that effectiveness. Indeed the unravelling of the myth that the state will always be solvent means that the state is not able to guarantee an adequate level of effectiveness of the pension system, but can only promise it, which is something quite different. - In terms of the efficiency of the pension system, it is important to diversify the risk of pension payments, and by the same token the pension liabilities, between the state and the market, or otherwise between the public and private sector. This view is supported by the fact that among the analysed pension systems, those that were classified as mixed type were more efficient on average. Moreover, among the countries analysed, it was found that systems based on the Beveridge model are more efficient than those based on the Bismarck model. - The more effective pension systems are less efficient, are characterized by a lower degree of economic balance, and have more of an adverse effect on the labour market. This conclusion may appear surprising, but if effectiveness in the present approach is identified to a large degree with the adequacy of the income provided by the pension system, while efficiency is identified with the system's stability and effect on the labour market, then the conclusion would seem to confirm the dependency according to which more generous old-age pension systems are less economical (and cost more).