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B. Hammer, A. Fürnkranz-Prskawetz, I. Freund:
"Reallocation of Resources Across Age in a Comparative European Setting";
Report for WWWforEurope project; Report No. Working Paper No. 13, 2013; 48 pages.

We investigate the reallocation of resources across age and gender in a comparative
European setting. Our analysis is based on concepts and data from the
National Transfer Accounts (NTA) project, as well as on data from income and
time use surveys. We introduce the aggregate NTA life cycle deficit as a concept
of an economic dependency ratio. This dependency measure allows for flexible age
limits and age-specific levels of economic dependency. We then move beyond the
current NTA methodology and study gender differences in the generation of income
and extend our analysis by unpaid household work. We find large cross-country differences
in the age- and gender-specific levels and type of production activities and
consequently in the organisation of the resource reallocation across age. Our results
clearly indicate that a reform of the welfare system needs to take into account not
only public transfers but also private transfers, in particular the services produced
within the households for own consumption (e.g. childcare, cooking, cleaning...).

Ageing, challenges for welfare system, demographic change, welfare state