Distributive Effects of Social Security and Pension Benefits
As the public debates the danger of the increasing federal deficit, social security is once again receiving public attention. Should the government de-emphasize social security and emphasize employer-provided pensions as a vehicle for providing retirement income? Before policymakers face this question, it is important to evaluate the role of these programs in shaping the level and the distribution of income among the retired. This article presents findings from a study based on the 1982 New Beneficiary Survey. The study found that, compared with employer-provided pension benefits, social security benefits not only assure a relatively higher level of income to economically disadvantaged demographic groups of recent retirees but also are significantly more effective in equalizing income distribution among a recent cohort of retirees. Policy implications are drawn from the study's findings.
Income of new retired workers by social security benefit levels: findings from the New Beneficiary Survey.
This article, based on New Beneficiary Survey (NBS) data, examines the sources and amounts of income available to newly retired workers by the level of their primary insurance amount (PIA). For this analysis, the PIA distribution was divided into quartiles. Retired workers with high PIA's were found to be more likely to have private pensions or asset income and thus to have the highest total income. When a spouse's income is taken into account, married retired workers at all PIA levels have higher total income than do the unmarried retirees. The difference between the income of married and unmarried retirees is greatest for those with PIA's in the lowest quartile, where the median total income of the married retirees is roughly three times as high as that of the unmarried group. New retirees with PIA's in the lowest quartile were a mixed group: Many had additional important sources of income; others did not and had income that was quite low. About 21 percent of those with PIA's in the lowest quartile had pensions and their median total income was about $19,100. An additional 55 percent were married women without pensions of their own who, together with their husbands, had a median total income of $15,900. The remaining 24 percent were married men and unmarried retirees without a pension and with much lower median income--$7,100 for the married men and their wives, and $5,000 for the unmarried men and women.
The income and resources of the elderly in 1978.
The Social Security Administration (SSA) recently released two publications dealing with the economic situation of persons aged 55 and older in 1978. These reports--Income & Resources of the Aged, 1978 (a chartbook containing 17 charts and brief explanatory paragraphs) and Income of the Population 55 and Over, 1978 (a staff paper containing 43 tables and supporting text)--are the most recent in a series of analyses of the aged population begun by SSA 40 years ago. By means of selected findings, tabulations, tables, and charts, this article presents a sampling of the information available in the two publications. The reports reveal that the aged as a group are no longer disproportionately poor compared with the adult population as a whole, and that the 1978 income of most elderly units had kept pace with inflation since 1976, the next most recent survey year.