IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/19036.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How Representative are Representative Workers? An Assessment of the Hypothetical Workers Commonly Used in Social Security Studies

Author

Listed:
  • Pfau, Wade Donald

Abstract

An understanding of the financial and distributional consequences of Social Security reform requires knowledge about the actual life circumstances of participants, including the level and pattern of their lifetime earnings and when they retire. Some analyses of Social Security reform make simplifying assumptions about these characteristics by using “hypothetical workers” with set career paths. We seek to develop greater understanding about actual lifetime earnings patterns to compare with hypothetical workers and find discrepancies which lead typical hypothetical workers to produce a more favorable impression for defined-contribution pension reforms. We suggest modifications to make a more suitable hypothetical worker.

Suggested Citation

  • Pfau, Wade Donald, 2009. "How Representative are Representative Workers? An Assessment of the Hypothetical Workers Commonly Used in Social Security Studies," MPRA Paper 19036, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:19036
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/19036/1/MPRA_paper_19036.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thomas L. Hungerford, 2003. "Do Workers with Low Lifetime Earnings Really Have Low-Earnings Every Year? Implications for Social Security Reform," Labor and Demography 0309007, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Edward Whitehouse, 2007. "Pensions Panorama : Retirement-Income Systems in 53 Countries," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 7177.
    3. Andrew Au & Olivia S. Mitchell & John W. R. Phillips, 2004. "Modeling Lifetime Earnings Paths: Hypothetical versus Actual Workers," Working Papers wp074, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    4. Thomas L. Hungerford, 2003. "Do Workers with Low Lifetime Earnings Really Have Low Earnings Every Year?: Implications for Social Security Reform," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_389, Levy Economics Institute.
    5. Steven Caldwell & Melissa Favreault & Alla Gantman & Jagadeesh Gokhale & Thomas Johnson & Laurence J. Kotlikoff, 1999. "Social Security's Treatment of Postwar Americans," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 13, pages 109-148, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Julia Lynn Coronado & Don Fullerton & Thomas Glass, 1999. "Distributional Impacts of Proposed Changes to the Social Security System," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 13, pages 149-186, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wade D. Pfau, 2008. "Assessing the Applicability of Hypothetical Workers for Defined-Contribution Pensions," GRIPS Discussion Papers 07-11, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.
    2. Jagadeesh Gokhale & Laurence J. Kotlikoff, 2002. "Social Security's Treatment of Postwar Americans. How Bad Can It Get?," NBER Chapters, in: The Distributional Aspects of Social Security and Social Security Reform, pages 207-262, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Steven Caldwell & Melissa Favreault & Alla Gantman & Jagadeesh Gokhale & Thomas Johnson & Laurence J. Kotlikoff, 1999. "Social Security's Treatment of Postwar Americans," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 13, pages 109-148, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Julia Lynn Coronado & Don Fullerton & Thomas Glass, 2002. "Long-Run Effects of Social Security Reform Proposals on Lifetime Progressivity," NBER Chapters, in: The Distributional Aspects of Social Security and Social Security Reform, pages 149-206, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Coronado Julia Lynn & Fullerton Don & Glass Thomas, 2011. "The Progressivity of Social Security," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-45, November.
    6. Johnson, Richard W., 1999. "Distributional Implications of Social Security Reform for the Elderly: The Impact of Revising COLAs, the Normal Retirement Age, and the Taxation of Benefits," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 52(n. 3), pages 505-30, September.
    7. John Geanakoplos & Olivia S. Mitchell & Stephen P. Zeldes, "undated". "Social Security Money's Worth," Pension Research Council Working Papers 97-20, Wharton School Pension Research Council, University of Pennsylvania.
    8. Tim Krieger & Christine Meemann & Stefan Traub, 2022. "Inequality, Life Expectancy, and the Intragenerational Redistribution Puzzle - Some Experimental Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 9677, CESifo.
    9. Gustman, Alan L. & Steinmeier, Thomas L., 2001. "How effective is redistribution under the social security benefit formula?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 1-28, October.
    10. Gilles Le Garrec & Stéphane Lhuissier, 2011. "Life expectancy, heavy work and the return to education: lessons for the social security reform," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-01069511, HAL.
    11. Gokhale, Jagadeesh & Kotlikoff, Laurence J. & Sefton, James & Weale, Martin, 2001. "Simulating the transmission of wealth inequality via bequests," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(1), pages 93-128, January.
    12. Stefan Traub & Tim Krieger, 2009. "Wie hat sich die intragenerationale Umverteilung in der staatlichen Säule des Rentensystems verändert? Ein internationaler Vergleich auf Basis von LIS-Daten," LIS Working papers 520, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    13. Erin Cottle Hunt & Frank N. Caliendo, 2022. "Social security and risk sharing: A survey of four decades of economic analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(5), pages 1591-1609, December.
    14. Sergey A. Budko & Dmitry Yu. Fedotov, 2017. "World Experience and Russian Practice of the Pension System’s Revenue Formation: Mathematic Methods of Estimation," Journal of Tax Reform, Graduate School of Economics and Management, Ural Federal University, vol. 3(3), pages 199-215.
    15. Gilles Le Garrec, 2012. "Social security and growth in an aging economy : the case of acturial fairness," Working Papers hal-01070354, HAL.
    16. Poteraj, Jarosław, 2008. "Pension systems in 27 EU countries," MPRA Paper 31053, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Kazumasa, Oguro & Junichiro, Takahata & Manabu, Shimasawa, 2009. "Child Benefit and Fiscal Burden: OLG Model with Endogenous Fertility," MPRA Paper 16132, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Eytan Sheshinski & Frank N. Caliendo, 2021. "Social Security and the increasing longevity gap," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 23(1), pages 29-52, February.
    19. World Bank, 2010. "Strengthening Caribbean Pensions : Improving Equity and Sustainability," World Bank Publications - Reports 2847, The World Bank Group.
    20. Jeffrey B. Liebman, 2002. "Redistribution in the Current U.S. Social Security System," NBER Chapters, in: The Distributional Aspects of Social Security and Social Security Reform, pages 11-48, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social Security; Hypothetical Workers; Defined-Contribution Pensions;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H55 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Social Security and Public Pensions

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:19036. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.