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Persistence in Labor Supply and the Response to the Social Security Earnings Test

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Author Info
Leora Friedberg
Anthony Webb () (Center for Retirement Research, Boston College)
Abstract

This paper investigates the impact on labor supply of changes in the Social Security earnings test in 1996 and 2000. We highlight how the persistence of labor supply choices influences both responses to policy changes and the estimation of such responses. We do this in two ways. First, we use data from the Health and Retirement Study and the Current Population Survey that allows us to compare employment transitions across cohorts that are differentially affected by changes in the earnings test rules. We show that conditioning on last year’s employment status is important in identifying responses to current earnings test changes. Second, we test the effect of not only current but also anticipated as well as past earnings test parameters which cohorts faced at earlier ages. We find that past and anticipated future rules influence current employment and earnings. Our results help to identify an effect of earnings test changes affecting ages 65-69 on employment at younger and older ages, which suggests caution about the use of neighboring age groups as control groups in analyzing responses to the earnings test. We also show that earnings test changes that were initiated in 1996 had an important effect, in addition to the changes in 2000 that have been extensively studied.

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Paper provided by Center for Retirement Research in its series Working Papers, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College with number wp2006-27.

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Length: 34 pages
Date of creation: Dec 2006
Date of revision: Dec 2006
Handle: RePEc:crr:crrwps:wp2006-27

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Keywords: labor supply social security earnings test employment

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. John Rust & Christopher Phelan, 1997. "How Social Security and Medicare Affect Retirement Behavior in a World of Incomplete Markets," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(4), pages 781-832, July.
    Other versions:
  2. Card, David, 1990. "Labor supply with a minimum hours threshold," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 137-168, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Emmanuel Saez, 1999. "Do Taxpayers Bunch at Kink Points?," NBER Working Papers 7366, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Coile, Courtney & Diamond, Peter & Gruber, Jonathan & Jousten, Alain, 2002. "Delays in claiming social security benefits," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(3), pages 357-385, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. Alan L. Gustman & Thomas L. Steinmeier, 1986. "A Structural Retirement Model," NBER Working Papers 1237, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Michael D. Hurd, 1993. "The Effect of Labor Market Rigidities on the Labor Force Behavior of Older Workers," NBER Working Papers 4462, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Alan L. Gustman & Thomas L. Steinmeier, 1999. "What People Don't Know About Their Pensions and Social Security: An Analysis Using Linked Data from the Health and Retirement Study," NBER Working Papers 7368, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Gustman, Alan L & Steinmeier, Thomas L, 1986. "A Structural Retirement Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(3), pages 555-84, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. repec:fth:prinin:262 is not listed on IDEAS
  10. Leora Friedberg, 2000. "The Labor Supply Effects of the Social Security Earnings Test," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(1), pages 48-63, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. Burtless, Gary & Moffitt, Robert A, 1985. "The Joint Choice of Retirement Age and Postretirement Hours of Work," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(2), pages 209-36, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. David S. Loughran & Steven Haider, 2007. "Do the Elderly Respond to Taxes on Earnings? Evidence from the Social Security Retirement Earnings Test," Working Papers 223-1, RAND Corporation Publications Department. [Downloadable!]
  13. Cogan, John F, 1981. "Fixed Costs and Labor Supply," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(4), pages 945-63, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Ruhm, Christopher J, 1990. "Bridge Jobs and Partial Retirement," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 8(4), pages 482-501, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. David Card, 1990. "Labor Supply with a Minimum Hours Threshold," Working Papers 642, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section.. [Downloadable!]
  16. Reimers, Cordelia & Honig, Marjorie, 1993. "The Perceived Budget Constraint under Social Security: Evidence from Reentry Behavior," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 11(1), pages 184-204, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Altonji, Joseph G & Paxson, Christina H, 1988. "Labor Supply Preferences, Hours Constraints, and Hours-Wage Trade-Offs," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(2), pages 254-76, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  1. Alicia H. Munnell & Steven A. Sass, 2007. "The Labor Supply of Older Americans," Working Papers, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College wp2007-12, Center for Retirement Research, revised Jun 2007. [Downloadable!]
  2. Jesse Bricker & Gary V. Engelhardt, 2007. "Measurement Error in Earnings Data in the Health and Retirement Study," Working Papers, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College wp2007-16, Center for Retirement Research, revised Oct 2007. [Downloadable!]
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