@article {8196, title = {Reconsidering the social security notch and retirement: Wealth and incentive effects}, journal = {Economics Letters}, volume = {132}, year = {2015}, note = {Export Date: 29 May 2015}, pages = {65-68}, publisher = {132}, abstract = {Using the Health and Retirement Study, we show that studies using the Social Security Notch cannot separately identify the effects of retirement wealth and forward-looking incentives on retirement because the Notch natural experiment changed both factors in offsetting ways. 2015 Elsevier B.V.}, keywords = {Retirement Planning and Satisfaction, Social Security}, doi = {10.1016/j.econlet.2015.04.016}, url = {http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?eid=2-s2.0-84928951822andpartnerID=40andmd5=1eeb34855b4e851f9fe1d8f8d1571926}, author = {Jeremy G. Moulton and Ann H. Stevens} } @inbook {5256, title = {Effects of Late-Life Job Loss on Wealth and Labor Supply}, booktitle = {Lifecycle Events and Their Consequences: Job Loss, Family Change, and Declines in Health}, year = {2013}, pages = {57-75}, publisher = {Stanford University Press}, organization = {Stanford University Press}, address = {Stanford, CA}, abstract = {This chapter considers the impact of job loss on economic well-being during retirement. Using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), it compares retirement wealth across individuals who experience a job loss and those who do not. Sizeable differences are reported, especially when the job loss occurs at young ages. Little evidence is found that displaced workers can make up these differences by shifting retirement to a later date. The inability to recover appears related to both the difficulty in becoming reemployed and, if a new job is found, working sufficiently long before retirement to offset the initial declines in assets.}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force, Net Worth and Assets, Other, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, author = {Ann H. Stevens and Jeremy G. Moulton}, editor = {Kenneth A. Couch and Mary C. Daly and Julie M Zissimopoulos} } @article {NBERw17657, title = {The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: Understanding Pro-cyclical Mortality}, number = {17657}, year = {2011}, institution = {National Bureau of Economic Research}, address = {Cambridge, MA}, abstract = {A growing literature documents cyclical movements in mortality and health. We examine this pattern more closely and attempt to identify the mechanisms behind it. Specifically, we distinguish between mechanisms that rely on fluctuations in own employment or time use and those involving factors that are external to the individual. Our investigation suggests that changes in individuals{\textquoteright} own behavior contribute very little to pro-cyclical mortality. Looking across broad age and gender groups, we find that own-group employment rates are not systematically related to own-group mortality. In addition, we find that most of the additional deaths that occur during times of economic growth are among the elderly, particularly elderly women, who have limited labor force attachment. Focusing on mortality among the elderly, we show that cyclicality is especially strong for deaths occurring in nursing homes, and is stronger in states where a higher fraction of the elderly reside in nursing homes. We also demonstrate that staffing in skilled nursing facilities moves counter-cyclically. Taken together, these findings suggest that cyclical fluctuations in the mortality rate may be largely driven by fluctuations in the quality of health care.}, keywords = {Mortality, Nursing homes}, doi = {10.3386/w17657}, author = {Ann H. Stevens and Miller, Douglas L and Page, Marianne E and Filipski, Mateusz} } @article {5779, title = {Retirement Wealth Across Cohorts: The Role of Earnings Inequality}, number = {WP 2008-186}, year = {2009}, institution = {Michigan Retirement and Disability Research Center, University of Michigan}, address = {Ann Arbor, MI}, abstract = {Changes in labor markets over the past 30 years suggest upcoming changes in the distribution of wealth at retirement. Workers from the baby boom cohort have spent the majority of their working years in a labor market with substantially higher earnings inequality than previous generations. This paper investigates how changes in lifetime earnings distributions affect the distribution of retirement wealth among cohorts retiring over the next decade. I use data from the Health and Retirement Study from 1992 to 2004 to estimate the relationship between lifetime earnings, pre-retirement private wealth and Social Security wealth. I show that changes in the lower half of the male earnings distribution explain a substantial portion of changes in the distribution of pre-retirement wealth. When pensions are added to the measure of wealth, the role of earnings is even larger, reflecting a strong correlation between changes in earnings across these cohorts and changes in the values of their employer-provided pensions. The present value of wealth from future Social Security benefits, in contrast, grows in real terms throughout most of the distribution. At the bottom of the male distribution of Social Security wealth, reductions in lifetime earnings limit this growth in real benefits, while at the top of the distribution earnings growth amplifies expected growth in Social Security wealth.}, keywords = {Demographics, Employment and Labor Force, Net Worth and Assets, Public Policy, Social Security}, url = {https://mrdrc.isr.umich.edu/pubs/retirement-wealth-across-cohorts-the-role-of-earnings-inequality-and-pension-changes/}, author = {Ann H. Stevens} } @inbook {5240, title = {Is Retirement Being Remade? Developments in Labor Market Patterns at Older Ages}, booktitle = {Recalibrating Retirement Spending and Saving}, volume = {1}, year = {2008}, pages = {13-29}, chapter = {2}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, url = {http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/oso/3057300/2008/00000001/00000001/art00003}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {7199, title = {What You Don{\textquoteright}t Know Can{\textquoteright}t Help You: Pension knowledge and retirement decision-making}, journal = {Review of Economics and Statistics}, volume = {90}, year = {2008}, pages = {253 -266}, publisher = {90}, abstract = {This paper provides an answer to an important empirical puzzle in the retirement literature: while most people know little about their own pension plans, retirement behavior is strongly affected by pension incentives. We combine administrative and self-reported pension data to measure the retirement response to actual and perceived financial incentives and document an important role for self-reported pension data in determining retirement behavior. Well-informed individuals are far more responsive to pension incentives than the average individual. Ill-informed individuals seem to respond systematically to their own misperceptions of pension incentives.}, keywords = {Pensions}, url = {https://www.jstor.org/stable/40043144}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5654, title = {New Measures of Pension Knowledge}, year = {2006}, abstract = {This paper uses self-reports of pension information from multiple waves of the Health and Retirement Study to examine the consistency, completeness and accuracy of pension knowledge. Previous work examining individual s knowledge of their pensions has relied on comparisons of employer-provided pension plan documents and self-reported pension plan components. Particularly for defined contribution pension plans, such comparisons may be misleading if the employer-reports are considered to be proxies for the true pension values. We show that patterns of pension reporting across time is consistent with substantial misinformation, but that pension information does seem to improve significantly immediately prior to separating from one s job. Conditional on reporting a value for defined benefit income or defined contribution account balances, individuals are reasonably consistent in their reports taken just before and after leaving a job.}, keywords = {Pensions}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {6911, title = {Do Changes in Pension Incentives Affect Retirement? A Longitudinal Study of Subjective Retirement Expectations}, journal = {Journal of Public Economics}, volume = {88}, year = {2004}, note = {National Science Foundation, grants 9905275 and 9907824}, pages = {1307-1333}, publisher = {88}, abstract = {This paper investigates the responsiveness of individuals retirement decisions to forward-looking measures of pension accumulations. In contrast to previous research, we use within-person variation in retirement incentives and are able to control for unobserved heterogeneity in tastes for retirement by studying a panel of subjective retirement expectations. We confirm that individuals do respond as expected to pension incentives, even when we control for individual fixed-effects. However, the magnitude of these responses differ when estimated from models based on within-person versus cross-sectional variation: the inclusion of fixed effects reduces the response by about half.}, keywords = {Expectations, Pensions}, url = {http://homepages.nyu.edu/ sc87/chanstevens_retirementexpectations.pdf}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5543, title = {What You Don{\textquoteright}t Know Can{\textquoteright}t Help You: Knowledge and Retirement Decision Making}, year = {2003}, note = {Boston College, Center for Retirement Research, and the Social Security Administration}, institution = {Cambridge, Mass., National Bureau of Economic Research}, abstract = {This paper examines the relationship between pension incentives, individuals knowledge about those incentives, and the retirement decision. Combining detailed self- and employer-reported data on private pensions, we construct measures of the accuracy of individuals self-reports of their pensions. We show that the minority of well-informed individuals display dramatically larger responses to financial incentives than indicated by average estimates. These results suggest that there is substantial heterogeneity in responsiveness to pension incentives across the population. Finally, we estimate a joint model of information acquisition and retirement decision-making. These results confirm the substantial differences in behavior between informed and uninformed segments of the population.}, keywords = {Education, Pensions, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, url = {http://papers.nber.org/papers/w10185.pdf}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5511, title = {How Does Job Loss Affect the Timing of Retirement?}, year = {2002}, note = {National Science Foundation Grants 9905275 and 9907824.}, institution = {National Bureau of Economic Research}, abstract = {We use the Health and Retirement Study to examine the effects of job loss on factors affecting retirement incentives, including earnings, assets and pensions. We then estimate models of the retirement decision, which take into account the incentive to retire and any additional effects of displacement that are not captured by retirement incentives. There are substantial effects of displacement on retirement incentives as the result of changes to both earnings and pensions. Displacement significantly increases the probability of retirement, but only a small fraction of the displacement-induced changes in retirement behavior and labor force participation are the result of workers responding to these altered retirement incentives.}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, url = {http://papers.nber.org/papers/w8780.pdf}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @inbook {5174, title = {The Effects of Job Loss on Older Workers}, booktitle = {Ensuring Health and Income Security for an Aging Workforce}, year = {2001}, note = {ProCite field 6 : In ProCite field 8 : eds.}, publisher = {W.E. Upjohn Institute}, organization = {W.E. Upjohn Institute}, address = {Kalamazoo}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens}, editor = {Peter P. Budetti and R.V. Burkhauser and Janice M. Gregory and H. Allan Hunt} } @article {6732, title = {Job Loss and Employment Patterns of Older Workers}, journal = {Journal of Labor Economics}, volume = {19}, year = {2001}, note = {ProCite field 3 : Rutgers U; Yale U}, pages = {484-521}, publisher = {19}, abstract = {This article uses data from the Health and Retirement Study to examine the employment patterns of workers aged 50 and above who have experienced an involuntary job loss. Hazard Models for returning to work and for exiting post displacement employment are estimated and used to examine work patterns for 10 years following a job loss. Our findings show that a job loss results in large and lasting effects on future employment probabilities. Four years after job losses at age 55, the employment rate of displaced workers remains 20 percentage points below the employment rate of similar nondisplaced workers.}, keywords = {Consumption and Savings, Employment and Labor Force, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, doi = {10.1086/319568}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5438, title = {Retirement Incentives and Expectations}, number = {8082}, year = {2001}, institution = {The National Bureau of Economic Research}, address = {Cambridge, MA}, abstract = {This paper investigates the relationship between expectations concerning retirement and incentives for retirement provided by employer-sponsored pension plans and Social Security. Measures of pension wealth and broader measures including earnings, Social Security, and assets are significantly related to individuals{\textquoteright} expectations to continue work in their 60s. Results show that individuals strongly consider these incentives when planning for retirement. However, the degree to which these incentives affect behavior varies greatly between OLS and fixed-effects estimation strategies.}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force, Expectations, Health Conditions and Status, Net Worth and Assets, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, url = {http://www.nber.org/papers/w8082}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5382, title = {Job Loss and Retirement Behavior of Older Men}, number = {6920}, year = {1999}, note = {ProCite field 8 : Rutgers U; Yale U and NBER}, institution = {NBER}, address = {Cambridge}, abstract = {This paper uses data from the Health and Retirement Study to examine the employment and retirement behavior of men aged fifty and above who have experienced an involuntary job loss. Hazard models for returning to work and for exiting post-displacement employment are estimated and used to examine work patterns for ten years following a job loss. The findings show that a job loss results in large and lasting effects on future employment probabilities, and that these effects vary with the age of the worker. Displaced workers in their fifties are estimated to have a three in four chance of returning to work within two years after a job loss, whereas for a 62-year-old job loser, the probability is less than a third. Once re-employed, men 50 and above face significantly higher probabilities of exiting the workforce than do workers who have not experienced a recent job loss; however, the direction of this effect gradually reverses over time. The net outcome of these entry and exit rates is a substantial gap between the employment rates of men who have and have not lost jobs, that lasts at least seven years.}, keywords = {Demographics, Employment and Labor Force, Retirement Planning and Satisfaction}, url = {https://www.nber.org/papers/w6920}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} } @article {5363, title = {Job Loss and Labor Force Dynamics of Older Men}, year = {1998}, institution = {Yale University}, keywords = {Employment and Labor Force}, author = {Sewin Chan and Ann H. Stevens} }