Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) applications and receipts vary greatly by state. This paper investigates the extent to which this geographic variation in SSDI applications reflects differences in health, demographics, and employment characteristics, state policies, and politics. We...

Policymakers have designed Social Security to be a progressive retirement program that replaces a larger share of monthly earnings for low- and middle-income workers than for high earners. However, previous research has found that, although the Disability Insurance (DI) component of Social...

In July and August 2009, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College (CRR) conducted a survey to gauge three things: 1) how people were responding to the loss of their retirement assets due to the financial crisis; 2) who was responding by increasing their expected working life; and 3)...

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) applicatons and benefit receipts vary greatly by state, which has led to concerns about potential inconsistencies in the way that states apply disability standards. An earlier brief concluded that more than 70 percent of the variation across states in...

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) applica­tions and benefit receipts vary greatly by state, which has led to concerns about potential inconsistencies in the way that states apply disability standards. This possibility has prompted numerous Congressional hearings and reports, and led...