The retirement mortality puzzle: Evidence from a regression discontinuity design

Matthias Giesecke

No 800, Ruhr Economic Papers from RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen

Abstract: I estimate the effect of retirement on mortality, exploiting two discontinuities at age-based eligibility thresholds for pension claiming in Germany. The analysis is based on unique social security records that document the age at death for the universe of participants in the German public pension system. Using variation from bunching of retirements at age-based eligibility thresholds, I demonstrate that retirement can have both mortality-decreasing and mortality-increasing effects, depending on the group of retirees who comply to eligibility at each threshold. To reconcile heterogeneous effects with likewise mixed results from the literature I provide evidence that the retirement-mortality nexus is driven by the activity change at retirement.

Keywords: retirement; mortality; age-based eligibility thresholds; regression discontinuity design (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H55 I12 J14 J26 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age, nep-dem, nep-eur and nep-hea
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:rwirep:800

DOI: 10.4419/86788928

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