Social Security Reform: An Analysis of the Ball/Altman Three-Point Plan
This article describes and analyzes the costs and benefits of a three-part Social Security reform proposal introduced by Robert Ball and endorsed by Nancy Altman. The Ball/Altman proposal consists of (1) gradually increasing the maximum earnings base until it reaches 90 percent of earnings; (2) dedicating the estate tax to funding Social Security beginning in 2010; and (3) investing a portion of the Social Security trust fund in equities. The article concludes that while the Ball/Altman proposed solution is not costless, it deserves serious consideration.
Crowding Out: Estate Tax Reform and the Elder Law Policy Agenda
This article examines the estate tax reform provisions of the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 in the context of important issues affecting older Americans. Contrary to policymakers' claims that the estate tax is a major concern for elders, this article shows that only a tiny minority of decedents have any estate tax exposure, and that the recently increased exemption will reduce this group even further. In any case, the estate tax is an issue for nonspouse survivors of an elderly decedent, rather than the elders themselves. Even more significantly, by focusing on estate tax reform, policymakers have ignored numerous issues that are truly more important to older Americans, including prescription drugs, long-term care financing, advance health-care directives, Social Security's earnings test, and undiversified pension plans. After examining each of these issues, the article concludes by suggesting that more attention be paid to issues that affect the medical and financial quality of most elders' lives, rather than the pecuniary interests of a few elders' nonspousal survivors.
Complexity, Network-Decisions And Alternative Risk Premia: Some New Theories Of Structural Change And Portfolio Decisions.
Structural Change is the basis for many decisions such as government fiscal and monetary policies, government interventions, corporate-expenditure decisions, corporate strategic decisions, portfolio management decisions in finance; household allocation decisions, etc.. Structural change in industries and national economies is increasingly more difficult to detect partly because of the growth and dominance of Complex Systems and “Networks” in modern industries and economies – such Networks and Complex Systems include GVCs (global value chains), retail store networks; franchising networks; internet networks; services networks; credit-chains in industries; online social networks; etc.. The relationship between Complexity and Structural Change is well established in the physics, applied math and economic dynamics literatures. Traditional definitions and modeling of structural change have erroneously focused on changes in labor, technological progress, market share, and or capital – which are grossly inadequate in the new economy and post- global financial crisis (as confirmed by changes in the global retailing and housing industries and other industries). Also the modeling of structural change seems to be constrained by the availability of data, and often omits the relationship between structural change on one hand, and globalization, financial stability and international financial contagion. This article: i) introduces the Operations Strategy Model of structural change, explains how it differs from the Lewis Model of Structural Change; and explains the often omitted relationship between operations strategy (of companies and government agencies) and structural change; ii) introduces other new Complexity-based models/theories of Structural Change in industries; iii) reviews the relationships among Operations Research, Complexity and Structural Change; iv) explains the symbiotic relationship between structural change on one hand, and economic growth, financial stability, financial contagion and globalization; v) discusses the significant gap between academic research and practice and explains some issues and factors that should be considered in the development and testing of structural change models; vi) explains how alternative risk premia can be generated from new models of Structural Change.