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SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH NETWORK
E M P L O Y E E B E N E F I T S , C O M P E N S A T I O N
& P E N S I O N L A W
Vol. 7, No. 23: August 17, 2006
Editors: PAMELA J. PERUN
Urban Institute
PAMELA@PLANETNOW.COM
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Topic of This Issue:
Social Security
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T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S
"Social Security Replacement Rates for Own Earnings Benchmarks"
OLIVIA S. MITCHELL
University of Pennsylvania - Insurance & Risk Management
Department, National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
JOHN W.R. PHILLIPS
National Institutes on Aging - Health Scientist
Administrator
"Social Security Reform in the US: Lessons from Hungary"
ANDRÁS SIMONOVITS
Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Institute of Economics
"Transforming the Role of the Social Security Administration"
COLLEEN MEDILL
University of Nebraska at Lincoln - College of Law
"Strategic Asset Allocation for Individual Investors: The Impact
of the Present Value of Social Security Benefits"
STEVE P. FRASER
US Air Force Academy
WILLIAM W. JENNINGS
U.S. Air Force Academy - Department of Management
DAVID R. KING
Government of the United States of America - Department
of Management
"Taxing the Global Worker: Three Spheres of International Social
Security Coordination"
ALLISON CHRISTIANS
University of Wisconsin Law School
"Estimating the Value of Changes in OASI Benefits under Social
Security Reforms"
CRAIG COPELAND
Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI)
"Social Security Benefit Uncertainty under Individual Accounts"
Y REHDER HDER HARRIS
Affiliation Unknown
JOHN SABELHAUS
Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
MICHAEL SIMPSON
Government of the United States of America -
Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
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"Social Security Replacement Rates for Own Earnings Benchmarks"
Contact: OLIVIA S. MITCHELL
University of Pennsylvania - Insurance & Risk
Management Department, National Bureau of Economic
Research (NBER)
Email: mitchelo@wharton.upenn.edu
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=41556
Co-Author: JOHN W.R. PHILLIPS
National Institutes on Aging - Health Scientist
Administrator
Email: PhillipJ@nia.nih.gov
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=381451
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=908985
ABSTRACT: Social Security reform proposals are often presented in
terms of their differential impacts on hypothetical or example
workers. Our work explores how different benchmarks produce
different replacement rate outcomes. We use the Health and
Retirement Study (HRS) to evaluate how Social Security benefit
replacement rates differ for actual versus hypothetical earner
profiles, and we examine whether these findings are sensitive to
alternative definitions of replacement rates. We find that
workers with the median HRS profile would be estimated to receive
benefits worth 55% of lifetime average earnings, versus 48% for
the SSA medium scaled profile. Since US policymakers tend to
prefer a replacement rate measure tied to workers' own past
earnings, using these metrics would yield higher replacement
rates compared to commonly used scaled illustrative profiles.
However, benchmarks that use population as opposed to individual
earnings measures to compare individual worker benefits to
pre-retirement consumption produce lower replacement rates for
HRS versus hypothetical earners.
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"Social Security Reform in the US: Lessons from Hungary"
Contact: ANDRÁS SIMONOVITS
Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Institute of
Economics
Email: simonov@econ.core.hu
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=255426
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=898561
ABSTRACT: The partial privatization of the US Social Security
system was clearly the top economic policy priority for the new
Bush administration. While many famous economists, publicists and
politicians support, others reject the partial privatization of
the Social Security system. The international comparisons have
been quite infrequent, concentrated on few countries (Chile,
Great Britain and Sweden) and left out similar reforms introduced
in similar situations, like in Hungary, Poland and other
ex-communist countries. In this article I try to make up for this
omission and outline the lessons from the Hungarian reform,
started in 1998. The conclusion is simple: such a reform is
possible but does not solve the problems of social security.
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"Transforming the Role of the Social Security Administration"
Cornell Law Review, Vol. 92, 2007
Contact: COLLEEN MEDILL
University of Nebraska at Lincoln - College of Law
Email: cmedill2@unl.edu
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=575069
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=921602
ABSTRACT: This Article examines the mechanisms by which workers
today save for retirement and compares these mechanisms with
national policy promoting retirement financial education. The
Article argues that current regulatory policy designed to educate
and encourage workers to save for retirement is both outdated and
fundamentally flawed due to conflicts of interest. The Article
proposes that a national-level public education campaign to
promote sound retirement financial planning is necessary, and
that the Social Security Administration is the federal regulatory
agency best-suited for leading this campaign. The Article
concludes by describing how the Social Security Administration
should structure and conduct a youth-oriented public education
campaign based upon the insights provided by the latest
psychological and behavioral economics research concerning why
individual fail to save for retirement.
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"Strategic Asset Allocation for Individual Investors: The Impact
of the Present Value of Social Security Benefits"
Financial Services Review, Vol. 9, No. 4, 2006
Contact: STEVE P. FRASER
US Air Force Academy
Email: steve.fraser@usafa.af.mil
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=459612
Co-Author: WILLIAM W. JENNINGS
U.S. Air Force Academy - Department of Management
Email: WJENNING@UMICH.EDU
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=50164
Co-Author: DAVID R. KING
Government of the United States of America -
Department of Management
Email: David.King@pentagon.af.mil
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=645899
Abstract: http://ssrn.com/abstract=912809
ABSTRACT: This paper demonstrates the dramatic effect of social
security wealth on individuals' asset allocation. We first
discuss why social security wealth should be included in
portfolio asset-mix decisions. We then draw parallels between
social security benefits and inflation-indexed treasury bonds to
help quantify the present value of social security benefits.
Finally, we show the portfolio impact of including social
security wealth under several asset-mix decision rules. Excluding
social security wealth from the asset mix decision results in
sub-optimal portfolios. Including social security wealth provides
an incentive for including more stock in the asset mix.
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"Taxing the Global Worker: Three Spheres of International Social
Security Coordination"
Virginia Tax Review, Vol. 26, Summer 2006
Contact: ALLISON CHRISTIANS
University of Wisconsin Law School
Email: achristians@wisc.edu
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=348301
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=898085
ABSTRACT: Social security is a fundamental part of every U.S.
worker's life in three spheres: contributions are required,
benefits are hoped for, and taxes on benefits may have to be
paid. If a worker splits a career between several countries, each
of these three spheres is affected. International coordination
has been achieved sporadically and inconsistently through a
combination of treaties and executive agreements that address the
three spheres in various ways. The result is a group of
overlapping and potentially dueling agreements that raise myriad
interpretational issues and create uncertainty for workers and
administrators. This article argues that rationalization of
international social security coordination requires adoption of
different institutional choices at the national and international
level.
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"Estimating the Value of Changes in OASI Benefits under Social
Security Reforms"
EBRI Notes, Vol. 27, No. 6, June 2006
Contact: CRAIG COPELAND
Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI)
Email: COPELAND@EBRI.ORG
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=255137
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=910254
ABSTRACT: A previous EBRI Notes (April 2006) examined the impact
of various Social Security reform alternatives on the percentage
of Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) beneficiaries below
specific thresholds of poverty. This paper builds upon that study
by determining the change in the distribution of the benefit
levels these beneficiaries would receive under the same
alternatives. In addition, it calculates for each beneficiary the
amount of savings that would need to be accumulated in order to
purchase a payout annuity (an insurance product that provides a
regular stream of income for life) that would compensate for the
decrease in benefits from these alternatives relative to
current-law benefits. Given the importance of Social Security to
those age 65 or older, any changes made to Social Security that
reduce benefits will have a tremendous impact on retirees'
incomes. This study captures the effect on Old-Age and Survivors
Insurance (OASI) benefits across all Americans born in specific
years (cohorts) whose OASI benefits commence at age 62 or older
and who have not received any other Old-Age, Survivors and
Disability Insurance (OASDI) benefits before that age from
various widely discussed Social Security reform alternatives.
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"Social Security Benefit Uncertainty under Individual Accounts"
Contemporary Economic Policy, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 1-16, 2005
Author: Y REHDER HDER HARRIS
Affiliation Unknown
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=633244
Contact: JOHN SABELHAUS
Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
Email: johnsa@cbo.gov
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=57372
Co-Author: MICHAEL SIMPSON
Government of the United States of America -
Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=637546
Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=904724
ABSTRACT: Social Security reforms that include individual
accounts change both the expected benefit and the benefit risk.
This article uses a long-term stochastic forecasting model to
estimate the distribution of expected benefits under a simple
individual account, recognizing uncertainties in the current
system. Introducing individual accounts increases the overall
variability of benefit levels relative to current law; indeed the
standard deviations of expected benefit gains exceed the level of
those gains. The increase in uncertainty about benefit
replacement rates is even larger, however, because individual
accounts partially sever the link between earnings and benefits
in the existing system.