Conference on Demographic Change and Fiscal Policy

Alumni House

University of California, Berkeley
October 16 & 17, 1998

Robert D. Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public Finance
&
Center on the Economics and Demography of Aging

Friday, October 16

Session I, Chair: Roger Craine, UC Berkeley

9:00 a.m. - 10:20 a.m.
Paper: Forecasting Population for Fiscal Analysis: Issues and Innovations

Authors: Ronald Lee, UC Berkeley
Shripad Tuljapurkar, Mountain View Research

Discussants: Daniel McFadden, UC Berkeley
James Smith, RAND

10:50 a.m. - 12:10 p.m.
Paper: Uncertainty and the Design of Long-Run Fiscal Policy

Authors: Alan Auerbach, UC Berkeley
Kevin Hassett, AEI

Discussants: Peter Diamond, MIT
Shripad Tuljapurkar, Mountain View Research

Session II, Chair: Alan Auerbach, UC Berkeley

1:50 p.m. - 3:10 p.m.
Paper: How Does a Community's Demographic Composition Alter Its Fiscal Burdens

Authors: Thomas MaCurdy, Stanford
Thomas Nechyba, Stanford

Discussants: Hilary Hoynes, UC Berkeley
Robert Willis, Michigan

3:40 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Paper: Social Security Provisions and Retirement Around the World

Authors: Jonathan Gruber, MIT
David Wise, Harvard

Discussants: Axel Börsch-Supan, Mannhein
Massimo Livi Bacci, Florence

Saturday, October 17

Session III, Chair: George Break, UC Berkeley

9:00 a.m. - 10:20 a.m.
Paper: Fiscal Policy, Social Insurance, and Demographics from a European Perspective

Author: Bernd Raffelhüschen, Freiburg

Discussants: David Weil, Brown
David Weir, Chicago

10:50 a.m. - 12:10 p.m.
Paper: Demographic Change and Public Medical Spending: Standard and Non-Standard Models

Authors: David Cutler, Harvard
Louise Sheiner, Federal Reserve Board

Discussants: Victor Fuchs, Stanford
Paul Gertler, UC Berkeley

Session IV, Chair: Ronald Lee, UC Berkeley

1:50 p.m. - 3:10 p.m.
Paper: Using Microsimulation to Examine Social Security's Long-Term Forecast

Authors: Steven Caldwell, Cornell
Jagadeesh Gokhale, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland
Laurence Kotlikoff, Boston University

Discussants: Nada Eissa, UC Berkeley
Kenneth Wachter, UC Berkeley

3:40 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Paper: Demographic Change and Public Assistance Expenditures

Author: Robert Moffitt, Johns Hopkins

Discussants: David Card, UC Berkeley
Philip Morgan, Duke