A number of alternatives to Social Security’s auxiliary benefit system have been proposed in the context of changes in American family and work patterns. This article focuses on one modification therein - lowering the 10-year duration-of-marriage requirement for divorced spouses. Using a...

This article uses a Restricted-Use File of the 2001 Marital History Topical Module to the U.S. Census Bureau's Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) to examine women's marital histories in relation to Social Security spouse and widow benefit eligibility. To assess marital trends over...

Social science findings routinely rely on proxy-reported economic data in household surveys. A typical assumption is that this information is not biased compared to self-reports, but empirical findings on the issue are mixed. Using a dataset that links workers in the 2004 Survey of Income and...

This article explores the effects of the timing of retirement on subjective physical and emotional health. Using panel data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), we test 4 theory-based hypotheses about these effects — that retirements maximize health when they happen earlier, later,...

Increased policy and academic attention has been placed on promoting retirement savings early in the life course. This study investigates the extent to which retirement savings behavior among young persons, a population for which retirement savings is important but typically low, differs by...

Using a rich dataset that links the Census Bureau's Survey of Income and Program Participation calendar-year 2004 file with Social Security benefit records, this article provides a portrait of the sociodemographic and economic characteristics of Social Security child beneficiaries. We find that...