The delayed retirement credit (DRC) increases monthly OASI (Old Age and Survivors Insurance) benefits for primary beneficiaries who claim after their full retirement age (FRA). For many years, the DRC was set at 3.0 percent per year (0.25 percent monthly). The 1983 amendments to Social Security...

This paper investigates individual responses to a simple scheme to privatize social security. The analysis explores the sensitivity of outcomes to how individuals project life expectancy, how they value spouse and survivor benefits, and to expected future reductions in social security benefits....

This paper examines the consequences of social security reform for the inequality of consumption across individuals. The idea is that inequality is at least in part the result of individual risk in earnings or asset returns, the effects of which accumulate over time to increase inequality within...

How much does the current social security system really redistribute from rich to poor? We use the PSID to estimate lifetime wage profiles and actual earnings each year for a sample of 1778 individuals, and we use mortality probabilities to calculate expected payroll taxes and social security...

The Social Security earnings test reduces benefits at a 33-50% rate once earnings pass a threshold amount - among the highest marginal tax rates in the economy. Previous research dismissed the importance of the earnings test but failed to take advantage of three changes in the earnings test...

166 countries have some kind of public old age pension. What economic forces create and sustain old age Social Security as a public program? We document some of the internationally and historically common features of Social Security programs including explicit and implicit taxes on labor supply,...