Essays on the portability of pension rights and distortions in labour mobility choices
Creators: name: Cavalleri, Maria Chiara
Publisher: name: IMT Alti Studi Lucca
Year: 2013
Subjects: HB Economic Theory

description: This thesis contributes to the debate on the role and efficacy of pension portability regimes in ensuring both a fair treatment
of workers and neutrality as regards to labour mobility choices.Drawing on important contributions from the literature, I perform a comprehensive analysis that aims to
bridge the gap between the economic and the political analyses of portability. In addition, I also present novel and unprecedented empirical insights on portability’s 
effects in the labour market. The thesis is comprised of an opening, introductory section followed by four main Chapters (from 2 to 5). Chapter 2 is devoted to a theoretical
and empirical analysis of labour mobility. Two main practices are primarily discussed: international and occupational mobility. Then, the issue of pension portability is 
described and examined in detail in Chapter 3. In this section, focusing on the European Union, I survey the current legal framework for the portability of both mandatory
public and private pension rights. While this analysis focuses on the current situation, I also review the historical evolution of rules and practices. This examination is 
complemented by a simulation exercise estimating possible pension entitlements for a representative worker accumulating pension rights in different EU countries. The simulations
are performed using real parameters of national pension systems and are based on empirical assumptions. Overall, Chapter 3 offers therefore a very thorough analysis of portability
regimes: both from a normative and an economic (i.e., costs vs. benefits) perspective. Chapters 4 and 5 contain two key empirical analyses in this dissertation. 
Chapter 4 focuses on the portability of complementary pension rights in Italy when job mobility occurs voluntarily across employers, but not across countries. 
Using micro-data from the Survey of Household Income and Wealth (SHIW), I examine whether coverage from an occupational pension plan has discouraged job mobility in 
Italy between 1998 and 2010. Such an effect has been documented to occur in other countries, especially the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom. However, 
there has never been a similar examination for the case of Italy. My analysis provide very weak or no effect of pension portability losses impacting on labour mobility 
decisions. There is, on the contrary, some evidence that pension-covered jobs are better jobs overall, for the ample set of benefits they offer to workers and of 
which the pension plan is only an element. For this reason, mobility out of these positions is less convenient and thus frequent. Finally, Chapter 5 examines whether past
difficulties in portability transfers affect the propensity for future international mobility. This is a unique research question that has not been studied in the literature
so far. Specifically, I test the hypothesis that a positive experience of portability encourages people to consider further opportunities of mobility abroad, whereas 
negative experiences are likely to lower such interest. Both these effects are tested and estimated empirically using data from the Standard Eurobarometer Survey No. 75.1 (2011),
covering 27 EU member states. I find that that easy portability in the past increases the propensity for job mobility abroad in comparison to people with no prior portability
experience. On the contrary, difficult experiences slightly depress the propensity for mobility.