Social Security
A Fresh Look at Policy Alternatives
Social Security
A Fresh Look at Policy Alternatives
Many of us suspect that Social Security faces eventual bankruptcy. But the government projects its future finances using long outdated methods. Employing a more up-to-date approach, Jagadeesh Gokhale here argues that the program faces insolvency far sooner than previously thought.
To assess Social Security’s fate more accurately under current and alternative policies, Gokhale constructs a detailed simulation of the forces shaping American demographics and the economy to project their future evolution. He then uses this simulation to analyze six prominent Social Security reform packages—two liberal, two centrist, and two conservative—to demonstrate how far they would restore the program’s financial health and which population groups would be helped or hurt in the process.
Arguments over Social Security have raged for decades, but they have taken place in a relative informational vacuum; Social Security provides the necessary bedrock of analysis that will prove vital for anyone with a stake in this important debate.
374 pages | 34 line drawings, 25 tables | 6 x 9 | © 2010
Economics and Business: Economics--General Theory and Principles
Reviews
Table of Contents
List of Tables
List of Figures
I. Issues in Evaluating Social Security’s Finances
Chapter 1. The Simmering Social Security Reform Debate
Chapter 2. Simulating U.S. Demographics and Economics: Beginning in 1970
chapter 3. Forward Motion: Demographic Transition, 1971–2006
Appendix 3.1. Mortality Rate Calculations
Appendix 3.2. Estimating Fertility Rates by Female Race, Age, and Education
Appendix 3.3. Marriage and Divorce
Appendix 3.4. Labor Force Status Transitions
Appendix 3.5. Calibration of Immigrants’ Characteristics
Chapter 4. Peering into the Future
Chapter 5. A Framework for Simulating Annual Nominal Earnings
Appendix 5.1. Method for Simulating "Effective Labor Inputs"
Appendix 5.2. Simulating Workers’ "Effective Labor Inputs" in 1970
Appendix 5.3. Regression for Simulating Life-Cycle "Core Labor Input" Trajectories
Chapter 6. Simulating Social Security’s Finances
Appendix 6.1. The Social Security Tax and Benefit Calculator
Chapter 7. Micromeasures of Social Security’s Financial Condition
II. Issues in Evaluating Social Security Reform Proposals
Chapter 8. Liberal Proposal 1 by Robert M. Ball: "A Golden Opportunity for the New Congress"
Appendix 8.1. Estate Tax Revenue Projections for the Robert M. Ball Reform Proposal
Chapter 9. Liberal Proposal 2 by Peter A. Diamond and Peter R. Orszag: "A Balanced Approach"
Appendix 9.1. Incorporating Diamond-Orszag Reform Elements into DEMSIM
Chapter 10. Centrist Proposal 1 by Representatives Jim Kolbe, Charles Stenholm, and Allen Boyd: "Bipartisan Retirement Security Act"
Chapter 11. Centrist Proposal 2 by Jeffrey Liebman, Maya MacGuineas, and Andrew Samwick: "A Nonpartisan
Approach to Reforming Social Security"
Chapter 12. Conservative Proposal 1 by the President G. W. Bush Commission to Strengthen Social Security: Model 2
Appendix 12.1. Benefit Offset Calculation under G. W. Bush Commission Model 2
Chapter 13. Conservative Proposal 2 by Representative Paul Ryan: "Social Security Personal Savings Guarantee and Prosperity Act"
Appendix 13.1. Progressive CPI Indexing Social Security Benefits under the Ryan Reform Proposal
Chapter 14. Key Conclusions about Social Security’s Financial
Condition and Reform Alternatives
Acknowledgments
Notes
References
Index