Publication: Population Aging and Households’ Saving in the Russian Federation
Loading...
Published
2015-10
ISSN
Date
2015-11-05
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
Using household data from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey, this paper assesses how aging affects saving. To overcome a systematic bias against the life-cycle hypothesis of survey data, the paper estimates how the age profile of saving changes when the micro data are corrected to account for the contribution to pensions (as additional saving) and receipt of benefits from pensions (as dissaving). With these corrections, the Russian data support the life-cycle hypothesis. A small decline in the aggregate saving rate, because of aging, can thus be expected. However, since aggregate saving rates result from a combination of age and cohort effects, this decline may not be significant. When extrapolating the rising trends of the cohort effect, the fact that younger generations are earning and saving more than older generation at the same age, the projection shows a growing aggregate saving rate. The changes in saving of future cohorts, for example because of changes in the growth rate of the economy, can affect the aggregate saving rate even more than aging.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Simone, Schotte; Bussolo, Maurizio; Matytsin, Mikhail. 2015. Population Aging and Households’ Saving in the Russian Federation. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 7443. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/22874 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Publication The Macroeconomic Implications of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Options(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-05-29)Estimating the macroeconomic implications of climate change impacts and adaptation options is a topic of intense research. This paper presents a framework in the World Bank's macrostructural model to assess climate-related damages. This approach has been used in many Country Climate and Development Reports, a World Bank diagnostic that identifies priorities to ensure continued development in spite of climate change and climate policy objectives. The methodology captures a set of impact channels through which climate change affects the economy by (1) connecting a set of biophysical models to the macroeconomic model and (2) exploring a set of development and climate scenarios. The paper summarizes the results for five countries, highlighting the sources and magnitudes of their vulnerability --- with estimated gross domestic product losses in 2050 exceeding 10 percent of gross domestic product in some countries and scenarios, although only a small set of impact channels is included. The paper also presents estimates of the macroeconomic gains from sector-level adaptation interventions, considering their upfront costs and avoided climate impacts and finding significant net gross domestic product gains from adaptation opportunities identified in the Country Climate and Development Reports. Finally, the paper discusses the limits of current modeling approaches, and their complementarity with empirical approaches based on historical data series. The integrated modeling approach proposed in this paper can inform policymakers as they make proactive decisions on climate change adaptation and resilience.Publication South Africa’s Fragmented Cities: The Unequal Burden of Labor Market Frictions(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-08)Using high-resolution administrative, census, and satellite data, this paper shows that South African cities are characterized by spatial mismatches between where people live and where jobs are located, relative to 20 global peers. Areas within 5 kilometers of commercial centers have 9,300 fewer residents per square kilometer than expected, which is 60 percent below the global median. Poor, dense neighborhoods are most affected. In Johannesburg, a 10-percentile increase in distance from the nearest business hub corresponds to a 3.7-percentile drop in asset wealth (a proxy of household wellbeing) and 4.9-percentile drop in employment. In Cape Town, the declines are 4.0 and 3.7 percentiles, respectively. Employment is 87 percent lower in the poorest decile than the richest in Johannesburg and 61 percent lower in Cape Town. These findings suggest that South Africa’s spatial organization of people and economic activity constrains agglomeration and reinforces inequality. This methodology provides a scalable and standardized data-driven framework to analyze spatial accessibility and agglomeration frictions in complex, data-constrained urban systems.Publication The Evolution of Local Participatory Democracy in Nepal(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-11-05)Nepal is, according to its constitution, among the world’s most decentralized countries, with a long and complex tradition of local-level public participation. This paper traces the evolution of Nepal’s modern participatory institutions, examining the extent to which they are “induced” by external interventions versus being “organically” rooted in indigenous practices. The paper identifies three broad phases: an initial focus on participation in project implementation; a subsequent phase that expanded citizen engagement; and a third phase of citizen empowerment, culminating in the 2015 federal constitution, which granted unprecedented local autonomy. The analysis yields five key findings. First, over the past 50 years, successive reforms have progressively expanded opportunities for citizens to influence local decision-making. Second, these reforms have integrated traditional participatory mechanisms into formal institutions of local government. Third, although central-level initiatives exist, most participatory platforms continue to operate at the local level. Fourth, the federal constitution has created a new landscape of local democracy, embedding autonomy and accountability. Fifth, although they are still valued in many ethnic and territorial communities, traditional participatory practices are gradually disappearing. The paper concludes by offering policy recommendations to help donor agencies and governments strengthen Nepal’s democratic trajectory. It argues that effective interventions should build on Nepal’s deep participatory traditions while recognizing the constitutional reality of far-reaching local autonomy.Publication Institutional Capacity for Policy Implementation: An Analytical Framework(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-07)State capacity is an important prerequisite for policy implementation, yet at the country level it is difficult to measure, assess, and reform. This paper proposes a focus on institutional capacity: the ability of public institutions to implement the specific policy mandates for which they are responsible. Based on a review of existing literature, the paper defines the different dimensions that compose institutional capacity and groups them into two cross-cutting categories: organizational dimensions (personnel, financial resources, information systems, and management practices) and governance dimensions (transparency, independence, and accountability). The paper proposes measures for organizational and governance dimensions using existing data, shows intra-institutional variation of these measures within countries, and discusses how new data could be collected for better measurement of these concepts. Finally, the paper illustrates how the framework can be used to diagnose the sources of common problems related to weak policy implementation.Publication Closing the Gender Gap in Entrepreneurship: Overcoming Challenges in Law and Practice for Female Entrepreneurs(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2026-01-07)Despite significant strides toward gender equality, women around the world continue to encounter systemic obstacles that hinder their entrepreneurial success. This paper systematically reviews the literature on the barriers female entrepreneurs face and the solutions proposed to overcome these challenges. It discusses institutional factors, financial factors, human capital factors, and social and cultural factors. The literature overview is complemented by a series of stylized facts that illustrate how overcoming some of these existing barriers is correlated with improved women’s entrepreneurship and female labor force participation, drawing on the World Bank’s Women, Business and the Law database as well as the World Bank’s Enterprise Surveys. The findings underscore the need for creating an enabling environment where women can thrive as entrepreneurs.
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Turkey Public Finance Review : Turkey in Transition--Time for a Fiscal Policy Pivot?(Washington, DC, 2014-05-20)Turkey has experienced rapid growth and improved social outcomes over the past decade. Per-capita income in United States dollar (USD) terms tripled during the first decade of the 21th century, and Turkey is now the world's 17th largest economy. Fiscal policy was an important component of the reform program that delivered these successes. Prudent fiscal policy also provided the fiscal space to soften the blow of the global economic and financial crisis in 2008-2009. This report documents the central role played by fiscal policy over the last decade and presents simulation results from a computable general equilibrium model that will help inform the future direction of fiscal policy to support sustained high growth. The dynamics of fiscal outcomes and private investment and savings raise a series of tradeoffs for policy going forward. The analysis in this report suggests that public investment can crowd-in private investment and promote a more sustainable growth path. Government revenue dynamics present another set of trade-offs. These fiscal trade-offs are likely to be exacerbated as the structural transformation of Turkey's economy slows down. Structural reforms can support the fiscal policy pivot, particularly by strengthening the supply side of the economy, for instance through an increase in female labor force participation.Publication Turkey - Country Economic Memorandum (CEM) : Sustaining High Growth - The Role of Domestic savings : Synthesis Report(Washington, DC, 2011-12)Domestic savings in Turkey declined significantly in the 2000s. The domestic savings rate declined from an average of 23.5 percent of gross national income in the 1990s to an average of 17 percent over the 2000-2008 period, and further to 12.7 percent in 2010. This decline was driven by the sharp fall in private saving, while public saving increased through most of the period. A strong fiscal adjustment underpinned the improvement in public savings in the post-2001 period. The adjustment was pursued to correct the fiscal expansion of the previous decade, and it led to a sharp reduction in the public debt to gross domestic product (GDP) ratio. This improved the public saving-investment balance and helped reduce the vulnerability of the economy to external shocks. With an expected increase in future investment needs, continued fiscal discipline will be vital for sustainable growth. The fall in private savings after 2001 was mostly a result of the decline in macroeconomic vulnerabilities. While the economy was growing fast, the positive impact of income growth on savings was overridden by an acceleration of private consumption stimulated by the increased availability of credit, fall in interest rates and previously postponed consumption. As the economy normalized and interest rates and inflation declined, so did household precautionary motives for saving. Eventually, however, continued economic stability and implementation of reforms discussed below should encourage saving by raising incomes. Structurally, Turkish households have a strong precautionary motive for savings. Macroeconomic vulnerabilities and the resulting unstable income streams, the risk of unemployment, and health risks are obvious reasons for household decisions to save. Declining interest rates (as in the 2000s) that reflected reduced risk premium and hence vulnerability reduced precautionary savings motives. Households where the head is an employer or self-employed rather than a wage earner tend to save more, while households where there is a green card holder (a non-contributory health program) save less, controlling for the income effect.Publication Poland : Saving for Growth and Prosperous Aging(Washington, DC, 2014-06)The recent financial crisis has emphasized the role of national saving for rising economic growth and promoting development. Since the crisis began, global markets have experienced deteriorating public finances, household deleveraging, differing speeds of recovery, and eroding confidence in financial systems, all of which have deterred long-term investments. In the context of this new growth agenda, the present report analyzes the trends and determinants of domestic saving in Poland and provides policy options for increasing saving, particularly over the long term. Improved national saving provides funding for a country to take advantage of more investment opportunities. From the microeconomic perspective, increasing national saving will support incomes in an aging society, helping address the issue of the adequacy of retirement incomes. However, increasing national saving involves also some costs, which should be carefully balanced against the potential benefits. In this context, the report is divided into seven chapters. Chapter one gives introduction. Chapter two presents recent trends and determinants of growth in Poland, as well as challenges for its long-term prospects. Chapter three discusses the determinants of and influences on the level of private saving. Chapter four complements this discussion by portraying the government's role in determining the level of saving in the economy. Chapter five discusses the importance of saving for the financial sector, its ability to promote saving, and instruments that may be promoted to meet the needs of Polish savers. Chapter six quantifies the impact of potential changes to the main determinants of saving on performance of saving and economic growth in Poland. Finally, chapter seven focuses on policy analysis.Publication The Market for Retirement Products in Sweden(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2008-10)Far-reaching changes in the regulation of financial markets and the organization of public pensions in the 1980s and 1990s transformed the landscape for retirement products in Sweden. First, banking and insurance were extensively deregulated in the 1980s, while the securities markets experienced major expansion. Insurance received a large boost from the authorization of unit-linked products in the early 1990s. Second, the public pension system was reformed. Survivor benefits for widows were eliminated from the public pillar in the late 1980s, leading to a large increase in demand for term life insurance. The old defined benefit public pension system was replaced by a notional or nonfinancial defined contribution (NDC) scheme, while a funded defined contribution (FDC) component was also created in the public pillar. The four occupational pension funds that cover the majority of Swedish workers were also converted into FDC schemes. This paper reviews the implications of these changes for the Swedish annuity market. It discusses the regulation of payout options in Sweden, highlighting the compulsory use of life annuities in the public pillar and the preference for term annuities in the occupational funds. It examines the performance of providers of retirement products, including the PPM, and reviews the increasing focus on risk-based regulation and supervision. The paper also emphasizes Sweden's success in moving in the direction of increased funding and privatization of old age insurance, while maintaining its basic character as a highly developed welfare state.Publication Poland - Public Expenditure Review : Background Papers(World Bank, 2010-03-08)This report looks at public spending on pensions, education, health, social assistance, labor market programs, and public wages. Presenting the findings of a series of studies and notes compiled sice April 2009, it highlights how reforming such spending, which comprises about one quarter of gross domestic product (GDP), is essential for mitigating the impact of the economic crisis and for transforming Poland from a welfare state to a workfare society in line with Government's Vision 2030. The report has two main messages. First, Poland can take measures to reduce public expenditures on social sectors and public wages by around 2.3 percentage points over the next three years. Second, beyond supporting the fiscal adjustment required in the context of the economic crisis, public expenditure reforms can also help bring about structural changes envisioned as part of the Government's strategy for 2030. This report provides a comprehensive assessment of Poland's social sector and public wage polices and lays out options for reform. The summary report has five parts. The first part lays out the macroeconomic context. It emphasizes that Poland has weathered the global economic crisis remarkably well but that the recovery is likely to be feeble and subject to uncertainty. The next part discusses the fiscal fallout of the crisis and argues that public expenditure reform should be a crucial pillar for fiscal consolidation. Sections three to five contain the main findings of the report. Section three presents a list of important reforms of public expenditures on social sectors and wages in support of Vision 2030. Section four simulates the fiscal impact of public expenditure reforms, with a particular focus on state budget expenditures. The final section discusses how institutional reforms in the areas of medium-term and performance-based budget can support the reform agenda. Volume two presents the detailed analyses of social sectors and institutional reforms of public finance.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Quantitative Analysis of Road Transport Agreements (QuARTA)(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2013-04-13)Road freight transport is indispensable to international economic cooperation and foreign trade. Across all continents, it is commonly used for short and medium distances and in long distance haulage when minimizing time is important. In all instances governments play a critical role in ensuring the competitive advantage of private sector operators. Countries often have many opportunities to minimize the physical or administrative barriers that increase costs, take measures to enhance the attractiveness and competitiveness of road transport, or generally nurture the integral role of international road freight transport in the global trade logistics industry. Road freight transport is critical to domestic and international trade. It is the dominant mode of transport for overland movement of trade traffic, carrying more than 80 percent of traffic in most regions. Generally, nearly all trade traffic is carried by road at some point. Therefore, the cost and quality of road transport services is of critical importance to trade competitiveness of countries and regions within countries. In fact, road transport is fundamental to modern international division of labor and supply-chain management.Publication Global Economic Prospects, January 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-01-16)Global growth is expected to hold steady at 2.7 percent in 2025-26. However, the global economy appears to be settling at a low growth rate that will be insufficient to foster sustained economic development—with the possibility of further headwinds from heightened policy uncertainty and adverse trade policy shifts, geopolitical tensions, persistent inflation, and climate-related natural disasters. Against this backdrop, emerging market and developing economies are set to enter the second quarter of the twenty-first century with per capita incomes on a trajectory that implies substantially slower catch-up toward advanced-economy living standards than they previously experienced. Without course corrections, most low-income countries are unlikely to graduate to middle-income status by the middle of the century. Policy action at both global and national levels is needed to foster a more favorable external environment, enhance macroeconomic stability, reduce structural constraints, address the effects of climate change, and thus accelerate long-term growth and development.Publication Poverty, Prosperity, and Planet Report 2024(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-15)The Poverty, Prosperity, and Planet Report 2024 is the latest edition of the series formerly known as Poverty and Shared Prosperity. The report emphasizes that reducing poverty and increasing shared prosperity must be achieved in ways that do not come at unacceptably high costs to the environment. The current “polycrisis”—where the multiple crises of slow economic growth, increased fragility, climate risks, and heightened uncertainty have come together at the same time—makes national development strategies and international cooperation difficult. Offering the first post-Coronavirus (COVID)-19 pandemic assessment of global progress on this interlinked agenda, the report finds that global poverty reduction has resumed but at a pace slower than before the COVID-19 crisis. Nearly 700 million people worldwide live in extreme poverty with less than US$2.15 per person per day. Progress has essentially plateaued amid lower economic growth and the impacts of COVID-19 and other crises. Today, extreme poverty is concentrated mostly in Sub-Saharan Africa and fragile settings. At a higher standard more typical of upper-middle-income countries—US$6.85 per person per day—almost one-half of the world is living in poverty. The report also provides evidence that the number of countries that have high levels of income inequality has declined considerably during the past two decades, but the pace of improvements in shared prosperity has slowed, and that inequality remains high in Latin America and the Caribbean and Sub-Saharan Africa. Worldwide, people’s incomes today would need to increase fivefold on average to reach a minimum prosperity threshold of US$25 per person per day. Where there has been progress in poverty reduction and shared prosperity, there is evidence of an increasing ability of countries to manage natural hazards, but climate risks are significantly higher in the poorest settings. Nearly one in five people globally is at risk of experiencing welfare losses due to an extreme weather event from which they will struggle to recover. The interconnected issues of climate change and poverty call for a united and inclusive effort from the global community. Development cooperation stakeholders—from governments, nongovernmental organizations, and the private sector to communities and citizens acting locally in every corner of the globe—hold pivotal roles in promoting fair and sustainable transitions. By emphasizing strategies that yield multiple benefits and diligently monitoring and addressing trade-offs, we can strive toward a future that is prosperous, equitable, and resilient.Publication The Container Port Performance Index 2020 to 2024: Trends and Lessons Learned(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-09-22)The Container Port Performance Index (CPPI) provides a global benchmark of how container ports perform in handling vessel calls. Developed jointly by the World Bank and S&P Global Market Intelligence, it measures the time ships spend in port and relates this to the number of containers moved during that time. This approach makes the CPPI a unique diagnostic tool that can highlight patterns in port operations and shed light on global and regional supply chain dynamics. Now in its fifth edition, the CPPI report covers the period from 2020 to 2024. It builds on a well-established methodology to generate scores for more than 400 container ports worldwide. Over time, the CPPI has become a trusted reference point for policymakers, industry stakeholders, and researchers who seek to understand how ports adapt to shocks, recover from disruptions, and identify opportunities for investments, reform and modernization. A major innovation in this edition is the introduction of multi-year trend analysis. Rather than presenting annual snapshots, the report now tracks how CPPI scores have changed across five years. This longitudinal perspective reveals shifts in port performance, showing where scores have risen, fallen, or remained stable. By linking these movements to external factors, the CPPI offers insights into how global and regional supply chains evolve under pressure. The results clearly mirror the crises that have shaken global trade. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CPPI scores in different regions declined sharply as congestion, equipment shortages, and delays overwhelmed many ports. By 2023, global averages rebounded in parallel with easing freight markets and reduced congestion. Yet 2024 brought new challenges: the Red Sea crisis disrupted major trade lanes, while climate-related constraints at the Panama Canal added further stress. These shocks were reflected in lower global and several regional average scores, underscoring the vulnerability of maritime transport to geopolitical and environmental events. The CPPI is not about comparing one port against another, but about understanding changes in performance over time. Ports that improved their scores often did so by reducing time at anchor, optimizing berth operations, investing in digital tools, and strengthening coordination across logistics partners. The evidence confirms that improvements are possible across ports of all sizes, and that rising scores are linked to deliberate actions to minimize time in port relative to containers moved. By consolidating five years of results, this edition transforms the CPPI into a long-term reference point. It shows how global crises have affected shipping, how different regions have adapted, and what lessons can be drawn for future resilience. The World Bank and S&P Global Market Intelligence remain committed to maintaining the CPPI as a global public good, providing transparency, comparability, and practical insights to support more reliable and sustainable maritime supply chains.Publication The Container Port Performance Index 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-07-18)The Container Port Performance Index (CPPI) measures the time container ships spend in port, making it an important point of reference for stakeholders in the global economy. These stakeholders include port authorities and operators, national governments, supranational organizations, development agencies, and other public and private players in trade and logistics. The index highlights where vessel time in container ports could be improved. Streamlining these processes would benefit all parties involved, including shipping lines, national governments, and consumers. This fourth edition of the CPPI relies on data from 405 container ports with at least 24 container ship port calls in the calendar year 2023. As in earlier editions of the CPPI, the ranking employs two different methodological approaches: an administrative (technical) approach and a statistical approach (using matrix factorization). Combining these two approaches ensures that the overall ranking of container ports reflects actual port performance as closely as possible while also being statistically robust. The CPPI methodology assesses the sequential steps of a container ship port call. ‘Total port hours’ refers to the total time elapsed from the moment a ship arrives at the port until the vessel leaves the berth after completing its cargo operations. The CPPI uses time as an indicator because time is very important to shipping lines, ports, and the entire logistics chain. However, time, as captured by the CPPI, is not the only way to measure port efficiency, so it does not tell the entire story of a port’s performance. Factors that can influence the time vessels spend in ports can be location-specific and under the port’s control (endogenous) or external and beyond the control of the port (exogenous). The CPPI measures time spent in container ports, strictly based on quantitative data only, which do not reveal the underlying factors or root causes of extended port times. A detailed port-specific diagnostic would be required to assess the contribution of underlying factors to the time a vessel spends in port. A very low ranking or a significant change in ranking may warrant special attention, for which the World Bank generally recommends a detailed diagnostic.