The Optimal Choice of Delayed Retirement Policy in China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper explores two-stage OLG model to study the optimal retirement decisions. The topic is interesting and there are some interesting findings and policy implications in the paper.  However,  I think some of the settings need to be reconstructed or further explained.

1. For individual saving s_i, it will be either part of the consumption or the inheritance at time t+1.  The settings that s_i will be equally distributed among the survivors are not appropriate. Thus, I think the utilities of the survivor and the deceased should be discussed separately.

2. The utility function in (3) needs more explanations. It's not common that the probability p and the preference parameter delta work as the power exponent. In suggest the authors to further explain the economic implications or cite some reference. 

3. I wonder if you could consider the three kinds of people with heterogeneous retirement mechanisms at the same time. That will be more interesting and practical.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, I put the response in the attachment, please check it, thank you very much for your constructive comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This paper has certain contribution to the current scholarship and realistic implications, yet the main setback lies in written expressions.

 

Language used is too arbitrary and jumping to conclusions voluntarily, leaving too little academic discussion in the context. The reference is not inserted into context. Please revise all in-text references. I think a rough citation format in the texts make this paper far away from reader-friendly-ness, especially in parts of literature review. What’s more, graphs’ data sources are needed, and it would be better if there are logic diagrams about the mechanism. In all, I find the model deduction and empirical findings are quite convincing, so I believe the main revision should focus on written presentation.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, I put the response in the attachment, please check it, thank you very much for your constructive comments

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Author,

It was a pleasure to read your article. Especially the results you find are valuable and contribute to the policy For this reason, I congratulate you. I think that minor changes in the sections will carry your article even higher. My recommendations are presented below.

Introduction:

-        Two times “Fourth”: “Fourthly, the model framework ... Fourth, this paper stays o…”. Moreover, the sentence “Fourthly, the model framework is not limited to the analytical solution” needs explanation. The model is not limited to something, so what it shows new?

-        Some language mistakes, for example: “Second 3 is steady-state analysis; Second 4..” I guess it should be “section”, not “second”

Part 2.

-        The title of this part should explain what kind of model, not only “the model”, but “the model of…” or “The theoretical framework for the model”

-        The authors claimed that “The theoretical framework consists of three sectors: households, firms, and government”, then in this part we can find 2.4 Marker clearing - ??? It needs explanation.

Part  2 and 3. It would be useful to provide some references to confirm the derived formulas.

There is a lack of limitations of the study.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, I put the response in the attachment, please check it, thank you very much for your constructive comments

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf