Excerpt: The inadequacy of the current U.S. public and private pension systems may warrant the establishment of a universal pension system (UPS), which would cover all workers -- full-time and part-time -- and require them to contribute at a level that can help provide them with adequate incomes when they retire. This paper develops options for a system of individual accounts to which, starting in 2007, each employee or self-employed worker would be required to contribute 3 percent of covered payroll (i.e., 3 percent of up to $97,500 in 2007). The UPS we describe would raise the total 'replacement rate' for average wage men to 49.0 percent of final wages -- provided Social Security is fixed -- or 39.8 percent if not[.]

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