Intergenerational fairness for the future of Europe

Client

Horizon Europe

Year

ongoing

Partner

Centre for Microsimulation and Policy Analysis, Universitat de Barcelona, Max-Planck-Institut für demografische Forschung, Politecnico di Torino, Tárki Alapítvány, Centre for Economic Analysis, Inštitut za ekonomska raziskovanja


Whether today’s decisions ensure sustainable living conditions for future generations is a key determinant of social cohesion and economic stability. intergenerational fairness is of crucial importance for Europe’s future, as demographic and technological changes are reshaping the distribution of resources and opportunities.

In the LIFe project, Prognos is working with international partners on behalf of the European Commission to investigate how key areas of life develop over the life course and across generations. The aim is to create a solid foundation for evidence-based policy decisions and to systematically map intergenerational inequalities.

Making intergenerational fairness measurable and politically controllable

The project focuses on the question of how intergenerational fairness can be consistently measured and assessed across countries. Together with partner institutions in seven European countries (United Kingdom, Spain, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Poland, Slovenia), Prognos is analysing the key factors influencing life courses and their distribution across generations. They take into account developments in education, employment trajectories, income, wealth, health and subjective well-being.

The project has three objectives:

  • to develop an integrated analytical model that maps life courses across generations,  
  • to define standardised indicators for measuring intergenerational fairness,  
  • and to provide a freely accessible open-source toolkit that can be used to assess the impact of policy measures on different generations.

Our approach

The project focuses on developing a multidisciplinary system and an open-source toolkit for microsimulations to evaluate policy measures, as well as creating harmonized indicators and an atlas on intergenerational fairness.

The methodology comprises:

  • Life course approach: analysis of opportunities and risks across the entire life cycle and between generations
  • Multidisciplinary integration: Linking insights from economics, demography, sociology, health sciences and political science  
  • Microsimulation: Modelling individual life courses and policy scenarios, including counterfactual analyses  
  • Comparative perspective: Development of harmonised models and indicators for seven European countries  
  • Intersectional analysis: taking into account differences in age, gender, education, household type, migration or income

This produces robust projections and scenarios that show how policy measures affect different generations in the short, medium and long term. Policy labs, survey experiments and stakeholder dialogues complement the analysis, present the results in a practical manner and translate them into concrete recommendations for action. 

The project is being implemented as part of Horizon Europe, the EU's key funding programme for research and innovation. Prognos is coordinator of the consortium.

Links and Downloads

To the European Commission’s Strategy on Intergenerational Fairness

Project team: Bianca Illing, Neysan Khabirpour, Lorenzo Pelizzari

Latest Update: 03.06.2026

Do you have questions?

Your contact at Prognos

Neysan Khabirpour

Senior Project Manager, Deputy Head of EU-Services

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