ABSTRACT

This chapter examines three—rather than merely one—types of reciprocity-based accounts of our intergenerational obligations, with the aim of increasing the level of generality and precision of our analysis. So, the sociological assumption is: reciprocity- based theories of justice are especially popular in the intergenerational realm, regardless of their level of popularity insofar as mtragenerational contexts are concerned. The double reciprocity model is demo-sensitive since it entails at the intergenerational level that ‘rabbit’ generations would be entitled to larger ascending transfers, simply because their descending transfers, i.e. their spending, would be larger. A relevant intuition could be that it is at least as fair to transfer part of the basket of goods inherited from the generation to the least well-off members of our own generation, rather than to the next generation. The level of pension benefits of the members of each generation would gradually decrease because of our scenario of demographic decrease.