During the negotiations over raising the debt ceiling, President Obama proposed cutting the annual cost of living adjustment for Social Security by switching to an index that would show a lower measured rate of inflation. This alternative index, the chained consumer price index (CCPI-U), shows...

Millions of American workers are poorly compensated for the work they do. This is not because they do not work hard or deserve adequate compensation. Rather, it is due to a political failure to ensure that increases in economic growth and productivity over the last several decades have been...

There have been a number of proposals in policy circles that involve raising the Social Security retirement age. This is viewed as both a way to reduce or eliminate the projected shortfall in the program and also a response to projected increases in longevity. This paper examines the impact of...

There is enormous public confusion (much of it deliberately cultivated) about the extent of Social Security’s projected shortfall. Many policymakers and analysts point out that projections from the Congressional Budget Office and the Social Security Trustees show the program to be out of...

We discover and document errors in public use microdata samples ("PUMS files") of the 2000 Census, the 2003-2006 American Community Survey, and the 2004-2009 Current Population Survey. For women and men ages 65 and older, age- and sex-specific population estimates generated from the PUMS files...

Using data that was gathered as part of a much larger study on human beliefs and values, the present study examines the opinions on the ethics of tax evasion that were gathered from a wide demographic of respondents in Egypt, Iran and Jordan. Comparisons are made between the responses from each...

This paper uses data collected from three surveys regarding attitudes on tax evasion to determine whether any trends can be identified. Comparisons are also made by gender, age, religious practice and marital status to determine whether attitudes toward tax evasion differ based on these categories

The ageing process in OECD countries calls for a better understanding of the future disease prevalence, life expectancy and patterns of inequalities in health outcomes. In this paper we present the results obtained from several dynamic microsimulation models of the Future Elderly Model (FEM)...

A number of studies have examined the relationship between tax collection and various demographic variables. However, until recently most of those studies have involved a United States sample population. The Internal Revenue Service provides demographic data for researchers on a regular basis....

Most studies of tax evasion take an economic or public finance perspective. Not much has been written from a philosophical or ethical viewpoint. That is probably because most economists are utilitarians and most lawyers are legalists. However, there is a small body of literature that addresses...