The Key Conceptions of Social Security: the International Practice and Ukraine

Abstract

The world-wide globalization processes and the political-military conflicts have exacerbated the problem of social security of the people of various world countries, which is usually seen from the perspective of both the State and the individual citizen. The article is aimed at analyzing the existing conceptions of social security from different perspectives – political, economic efficiency, and narrative. An analysis of political theories of social security (majority rational voting; pressure groups) has determined that they are based on the redistribution processes, and winning of the individual economic agents is achieved in the political struggle for various «social prizes». An analysis of theories of efficiency (optimal redistribution; optimal retirement insurance; prodigal father; misguided Keynesian; longevity insurance; government economizes on administration costs; return on human capital investment) has determined that they rely on market «fiasco» and can help in understanding which from the social protection programs minimize market failures. An analysis of the descriptive (narrative) theories (chain letters; lump of labor; monopoly capitalism; nearly rational policy) has determined that they are difficult subject to the mathematical interpretation and partially repeat ideas of the previous concepts.

Keywords

• social security
• insurance
• special interest groups
• rents