Employment among Social Security disability program beneficiaries, 1996-2007

We use linked administrative data from program and earnings records to summarize the 2007 employment rates of Social Security disability program beneficiaries at the national and state levels, as well as changes in employment since 1996. The findings provide new information on the employment activities of beneficiaries that should be useful in assessing current agency policies and providing benchmarks for ongoing demonstration projects and future return-to-work initiatives. The overall employment rate--which we define as annual earnings over $1,000--was 12 percent in 2007. Substantial variation exists within the population. Disability Insurance beneficiaries and those younger than age 40 were much more likely to work relative to other Social Security beneficiaries. Additionally, substantial regional variation exists across states; employment rates ranged from 7 percent (West Virginia) to 23 percent (North Dakota). Moreover, we find that the employment rates among beneficiaries were sensitive to the business cycle and persistent over time.     

Workers' compensation, Social Security Disability Insurance, and the offset: a fact sheet

This article offers a brief summary of the workers' compensation and Social Security Disability Insurance programs. Information highlighted includes the differences between the two programs' types and terms of coverage. It compares the differing patterns in workers' compensation and Social Security disability benefits as a percentage of wages over the past few decades and considers the potential causes for such trends. The article also explains the offset provision included in the 1965 Social Security Amendments, the intention behind the offset, and how and when offsets are applied.     

Social Security: a financial appraisal for the median voter

Several explanations have been proposed for why voters continue to support unfunded social security systems. Browning (1975) suggests that the extremely large unfunded pension systems of most democracies depend on the existence of a voting majority composed of middle-aged and older people who fail to fully internalize the cost of financing the system. In fact, when voting, economically rational workers consider only their current and future contributions to the system and their expected pension benefits--not their past contributions, which they regard as sunk costs. If, for a majority of voters, the expected continuation return from social security exceeds the return from alternative assets, an unfunded social security system is politically sustainable. This article explores the validity of Browning's proposition by quantifying the returns that U.S. voters in presidential elections from 1964 to 1996 have obtained, or expect to obtain, from Social Security. Did "investments" in Social Security outperform alternative forms of investment, such as mutual funds or pension funds, for a majority of the voters? What can be expected for the future? The U.S. Social Security system redistributes income within age cohorts on the basis of sex, income, and marital status. To account for some of these features, the median voter is represented by a family unit whose members--a husband who accounts for 70 percent of household earnings and a wife who accounts for 30 percent--make joint economic and voting decisions. Thus, retirement and survival benefits paid out to the spouse of an insured worker can be included in the calculation of Social Security returns. Interval estimates of voters' family incomes from the U.S. Census Bureau were used to obtain the median voter's household earnings. The median voter's age is derived from the ages of those who voted in presidential elections, not from the ages of the entire electorate. The median voter's contributions to Social Security are the product of the joint employer/employee Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) tax rate and employee earnings. Data on actual contributions are available for median voters in the 1964 to 1976 elections; Social Security Administration (SSA) estimates are used for future tax rates and average wage growth rates. Data on actual old-age, retirement, and survivor benefits, as well as estimates of future benefits, are also available from SSA. Analysis of ex-post returns from "investing" in Social Security and from a buy-and-hold strategy applied to three alternative assets--the Standard & Poor's Composite Index (S&P), the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), and U.S. government bonds--shows surprising results. In 1964 and 1968, Social Security largely outperformed the other three assets. In 1972, Social Security and the stock market performed almost equally. In 1976, however, the median voter would have been better off in the stock market. The expected returns for median voters in later elections cannot be directly compared with realized returns from alternative assets. However, estimates range from 5.7 percent in 1984 to 7.0 percent in 1996 and thus compare favorably with average returns of 5.6 percent for S&P, 5.3 percent for DJIA, and 2.1 percent for government bonds over the 1964-1996 period. Although these findings must be taken with caution since they compare ex-post returns, they show that, despite a continuous reduction in profitability, Social Security still represents a safe, high-return asset for a majority of families.     

Developments and trends in Social Security, 1990-1992: overview of principal trends.

The article that follows is a reprint of Part I of a report presented by Dalmer D. Hoskins, Secretary General of the International Social Security Association (ISSA), to the organization's XXIVth General Assembly (November 1992, Acapulco). It identifies and interprets the major trends currently influencing the evolution of social security programs around the world, and analyzes these developments against the backdrop of the current economic, demographic, and social environment in which these programs operate. (Part II of the report analyzes the changes according to each major branch of social security; an annex to the report provides more detailed information and source citations in reference to these changes.) The ISSA is a nongovernmental international organization headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. It is made up of 321 social security-related institutions, including the U.S. Social Security Administration, in 122 countries. The Association's aim is to protect, promote, and develop social security worldwide.     

Workers' compensation: a background for Social Security professionals

This article provides a brief history and background of workers' compensation programs for occupationally injured and ill workers in the United States. It presents the basic principle involved in workers' compensation and briefly discusses the disability benefits to which workers are generally entitled. It also discusses why there are settlements in this disability program and the availability of information about the amounts paid in workers' compensation cases for obtaining an offset for Social Security Disability Insurance benefits paid to the worker. Finally, the article explains the rationale behind the public policy on coordination of Disability Insurance and workers' compensation in the new paradigm of disability and return to work.     

社保制度的建设:多元利益的博弈——从农民和农民工的参保行为反思社保制度的建设

社保制度的建设过程是对各方利益进行权衡和博弈的过程，国家、地方、企业和个人构成社保制度建设的多方主体。在资本跨国流动、国际劳动力市场不平衡的背景下，单纯依靠国家（决策部门）或专家学者来制定一个有效的社会保障制度是不现实的。当前社会保障制度的推行中，农民热情不高、农民工退保等现象反映出当前社保制度设计过程中相关直接利益者的缺位。在社会保障制度的建立和完善过程中，应将地方、参保企业、参保个人纳入制度建设的主体，让他们的利益诉求充分表达出来，并就各方利益冲突进行协商、妥协。国家在掌握足够真实信息的基础上才能把握社会保障制度建设和完善的方向。     

Lifetime redistribution under the Social Security program: a literature synopsis.

This article provides a brief overview of the more important studies of lifetime redistribution under the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (DI) programs. Studies are categorized into two types, those that focus on redistribution across successive cohorts of workers or typical members of those cohorts and those that focus on the distribution of results across characteristics of interest within particular cohorts of workers. A list of related studies is provided at the end of the article for those interested in additional reading.     

Purchasing power of U.S. Social Security benefits abroad, 1970-82

This article examines whether the small number of Social Security beneficiaries living abroad enjoy a higher standard of living than they would with the same benefits if they lived in the United States. The article addresses this question using two methods. First, absolute comparisons of U.S. dollar purchasing power abroad are made using "purchasing power parities," a method recently developed to allow international comparisons of real standards of living. Second, the effects of changes in Social Security benefit levels, exchange rates, and rates of inflation on the relative value of benefits abroad are measured. Both methods show considerable instability in purchasing power of Social Security benefits in the 1970's. Although beneficiaries in 1970 generally could live better abroad than in the United States, this advantage eroded considerably during the 1970's, followed by some improvement in 1981-82.     

National Provident Funds: The Challenge of Harmonizing Their Social Security, Social and Economic Objectives

This paper examines the national provident funds (NPFs) that operate in 23 developing countries which seek to provide their members with basic social security protection by means of compulsory savings (see Appendix). It explores how the juxtaposition of economic, social and social security objectives has made NPFs generally resilient to fundamental change and has, in some instances, resulted in the evolution of a social security hybrid—neither a pure compulsory savings scheme nor a social insurance system.     

Lost Imperium: the European Liberation Front (1949-54)

In 1947, just two years after the fall of Nazi Germany, an American expatriate living in Ireland named Francis Parker Yockey wrote Imperium, a massive tome that advanced a new strategy for post-war European fascism. Yockey insisted that fascists abandon their narrow nationalist viewpoint and, instead, fight for a new European-wide fascist empire, which he dubbed the 'Imperium'. In 1948 Yockey and his closest collaborators left Oswald Mosley's Union Movement and founded the European Liberation Front (ELF), a British-based groupuscule that lasted until 1954. Rejecting the possibility of building a mass fascist movement in post-war Europe, the ELF defined its primary task as ideological: namely, the advancement of the 'Imperium' idea inside the ranks of Europe's 'fascist elite'. The ELF soon ran into stiff opposition from Mosley over Yockey's controversial identification of the United States, and not the Soviet Union, as Europe's 'main enemy'. The ELF also met with fierce resistance from Hitler worshippers inside the British right like Arnold Leese, who rejected the ELF's emphasis on 'culture' over 'race'. Despite the ELF's relatively brief existence as a groupuscule, its introduction of a new kind of 'Eurofascist' thinking has recently led to its rediscovery by contemporary European New Rightists now searching for a new political strategy following both the end of the Cold War and the emergence of the United States as the world's sole 'superpower'.     

Up and Down with the Extreme Right in Germany, 1949-1996

In the post-war period, (West) Germany has experienced several cycles of extreme right-wing protest. In this article, the dynamics of these cycles will be studied. What are the causes of the cyclical 'ups' and 'downs' in the extreme right's electoral fortunes? Are the cycles of violent activity related to the cycles of electoral success? In order to address these questions, the extreme right will be analysed as a social movement whose activities are a result of the interplay between the political opportunity structure and the strategic choices made by extreme right-wing activists.     

Comparative Social Security: The Challenge of Evaluation

There has been dramatic global expansion in the national provision of social security programs throughout the twentieth century. This has provided very fertile ground for the comparative analysis of social security programs and systems over the last forty-five years. Most comparative studies, however, have, been content to describe and compare strategies, programs, institutions and values at the multinational or regional levels. There has been considerable reluctance either to engage in global studies or to embark on comparative-evaluative studies. This paper seeks to fill this gap by providing a framework for an evaluation methodology that permits the global ranking of social security systems and programs.     

Seeing Red: U.S. Air Force Assessments of the Soviet Union, 1945-1949

In the immediate postwar period Army Air Force A-2 cultivated a unique intelligence culture that focussed on the air-atomic threat posed by the Soviet Union and the use of the most advanced technologies to monitor countries behind the 'Iron Curtain'. Although most intelligence reports presented a detailed analysis of Russian air power capabilities, consideration was also given to an assessment of intentions. Based on a literal interpretation of Marxist texts and an unambiguous reading of Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, A-2 more than any other agency was convinced of the Soviet willingness to wage war. As for a reading of capabilities, the fact that the Soviets were developing a long-range air force was in itself evidence of intentions. A-2 was, however, left out of the national security decision-making loop until after the successful test of the Soviet A-bomb, which was accurately predicted by the Air Force in the summer of 1949. Until that time most officials in the Truman administration believed in the likelihood of the slow incremental expansion of Soviet power rather than the launching of an 'atomic Pearl harbor' against the Western bloc.     

论内保工作发展趋势——走社会保安服务之路

传统内保工作体制受到市场经济的挑战,改革这种体制是大势新趋.本文认为内保工作走社会保安服务之路是社会化分工的需要,是经济发展的趋势,是西方发达国家政府鼓励发展的方向,它比传统的内保工作具有明显的优势,走社会保安服务之路是今后内保工作发展的趋势.