Report on the impact of social security on private sector savings in the USA - presents the controversial points of view of r j barro and m feldstein concerning capital formation, taking into consideration consumer expenditure in the period from 1929 to 1974, and includes estimates on the reduction of personal savings due to social security wealth. References and statistical tables.

Report on the impact of social security on private sector savings in the USA - presents the controversial points of view of r j barro and m feldstein concerning capital formation, taking into consideration consumer expenditure in the period from 1929 to 1974, and includes estimates on the reduction of personal savings due to social security wealth. References and statistical tables.

This volume represents the most important work to date on one of the pressing policy issues of the moment: the privatization of social security. Although social security is facing enormous fiscal pressure in the face of an aging population, there has been relatively little published on the fundamentals of essential reform through privatization. Privatizing Social Security fills this void by studying the methods and problems involved in shifting from the current system to one based on mandatory saving in individual accounts. "Timely and important. . . . [Privatizing Social Security] presents a forceful case for a radical shift from the existing unfunded, pay-as-you-go single national program to a mandatory funded program with individual savings accounts. . . . An extensive analysis of how a privatized plan would work in the United States is supplemented with the experiences of five other countries that have privatized plans." —Library Journal "[A] high-powered collection of essays by top experts in the field."—Timothy Taylor, Public Interest

Monograph on the impact of the social security and old age benefit programme on personal saving for retirement in the USA - includes the research methodology. Bibliography pp. 133 to 136, references and statistical tables.

The social security system affects people throughout most of their lives, at work and in retirement. The supposed effects of social security on saving, labor supply, and the distribution of income figure prominently in current debates about whether and how to change the system. Theorists have developed alternative analytical frameworks for studying social security, but all involve extreme assumptions introduced for the sake of analytical tractability. Each study seems to describe the behavior of some, but not all or even most people. The shortcomings of available data have created additional roadblocks. As a result, the effects of social security on saving and labor supply are difficult to measure, and how such a complex system influences behavior is not at all well understood. Yet decisions on social security cannot be avoided. If analysts cannot agree, policymakers are likely to increase the weight they attach to perceptions of equity, adequacy of benefits, fairness of taxes, and similar qualitative considerations. Hence it is desirable for lay observers to understand the framework that analysts use and the reasons why there is so much uncertainty. This book sheds light on social security issues by examining evidence from economic studies about how the system affects saving, labor supply, and income distribution. It shows that these studies provide little evidence to support or refute assertions that social security has reduced saving, but they do indicate that it has contributed to the trend toward early retirement. The author finds that the aged are now about as well off on the average as the general population and that social security has played a considerable role in bringing about this equality. This volume is the sixteenth in the second series of Brookings Studies of Government Finance.

While the short-run financial status of Social Security is secure, its long-run financial status is very uncertain. The retirement and disability part of the system (OASDI) is projected to be in long-run actuarial deficit under the Social Security Administration's intermediate economic and demographic f9recasts. Hospital Insurance (HI) is projected to run a large deficit, beginning in the 1990s. OASDI is projected to accrue a very large surplus over the next thirty years, peaking at almost 30% of GNP. Social Security has never accrued a surplus this large; it may well be dissipated for other purposes, such as to bail out HI, fund other programs, raise benefits, or cut taxes. These alternatives may affect net national saving, directly because Social Security surpluses or deficits are part of government sector saving and indirectly through effects on private saving or the non-Social Security part of the federal government budget. This paper documents how various systematic deviations from, or return to, pay-as-you-go finance of the Social Security system may affect net national saving. For example, under base case assumptions with respect to the non-Social Security deficit, a constant net private saving rate of 6%, and long-run budget balance in the state and local government sector, the Social Security deficit offsets 40% of other net national saving over the Social Security Administration's 75-year projection period. In the first 25-year sub-period, the Social Security surplus adds one-sixth to other net national saving; in the second, it offsets almost one-half; and in the third, it offsets five-sixths of other net national saving. Of course, private saving may respond to changes in Social Security's funding as may the non-Social Security balance in the federal budget. The paper presents several alternative scenarios such as benefits increasing or taxes falling during the OASDI surplus period, various stylized rules concerning the non-Social Security budget deficit, and separate balancing of HI via outlay reductions or tax increases. The results indicate that OASDI may effect net national saving substantially. For example, if benefits ratchet up during what would have been the period of the OASDI surplus, the OASDI system may subsequently offset virtually all of remaining net national saving. On the other hand, if HI is brought into balance and the OASDI surplus is allowed to accrue, Social Security will offset only about 4% of other net national saving. Changes in private saving may accentuate or ameliorate the swings in the net national saving rate generated by the future financing of OASDHI, but the alternative financing options will be important determinant of net national saving, and therefore of private domestic investment and international capital flows.