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This paper studies social security reforms in a model with declining population growth and increasing life expectancy. Based on simulations using data on China, it is found that a switch from a pay-as-you-go (PAYG) system to a notional defined contribution system favors the rich, causes the poor to work more, and may change the capital-effective labor ratio depending on the rate of return to personal accounts. A switch from the PAYG system to a modified PAYG system that saves part of the receipts, with the interest rate greater than the growth rate, increases labor supply and decreases the capital-effective labor ratio in period one; decreases labor supply and increases the capital-effective labor ratio after period one; and hurts the poor old more than the rich old while benefitting the poor in future generations more than the rich. If the interest rate is less than the growth rate, the accumulated funds are insufficient to balance the social security budget. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The courts have done little to ameliorate the harsh 'austerity' reforms pursued by the government since 2010, adopting a highly deferential approach towards human rights claims in the social security context. This article identifies the two key moves to achieve this result: adopting the manifestly without reasonable foundation standard of justification and treating indirect discrimination claims on suspect grounds as not 'real' discrimination claims. It shows nonetheless the untapped potential of Convention rights, since even within this framework strong arguments were still available to the courts, based on the functioning of the social security system, which should have rendered two of the harshest reforms, the two-child limit and especially the benefit cap, Convention incompatible. The cap, which limits the subsistence benefits of unemployed families, is justified as a work-incentive policy, yet through Universal Credit the state also independently assesses families affected by the cap as doing all that they reasonably can to find work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]