How To Share The Burden

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PAYBACK TIME: Pensioners on the march in London

Whose job is it to pay your pension? That's a crucial question that has long divided Europe between two approaches: one named after Otto von Bismarck, the 19th century German Chancellor, the other after William Beveridge, the liberal economist who laid the groundwork for the British welfare state in the 1940s. The Bismarckian philosophy, adopted by countries such as Germany, Austria, Italy, France and Spain, is that it's the state's role to insure people against losses of income in old age. In countries taking the Beveridge approach, such as Britain, Switzerland and the Netherlands, the state provides a modest pension to...

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