Search Results
Journal Article
Back to the future: prospective deficits through the prism of the past
A look at the Clinton administration's first piece of budget legislation--the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 (OBRA93)--showing that although it appears to be more successful than OBRA90, its Bush administration predecessor, it may still be subject to the same type of unanticipated "technical" problems that undermined the earlier legislation.
Working Paper
Generational accounting: the case of Italy
An examination of the generational imbalance in current Italian fiscal policy, showing that unless dramatic steps are taken soon, future generations' net tax bill will be four or more times the amount that today's newborns are slated to pay.
Working Paper
The mismatch between life insurance holdings and financial vulnerabilities: evidence from the Health and Retirement Survey
Using data on older workers from the 1992 Health and Retirement Survey, along with an elaborate life-cycle planning model, the authors quantify the effect of each individual's death on the financial status of his or her survivors and the degree to which life insurance holdings moderate these consequences. The average change in living standard that would result from a spouse's death is small, both in absolute terms and relative to the decline that would occur without insurance. However, this average obscures a startling mismatch between insurance holdings and underlying vulnerabilities. For ...
Working Paper
Social Security's treatment of postwar Americans: how bad can it get?
The authors consider Social Security?s treatment of postwar Americans under alternative tax increases and benefit cuts that would help bring the system?s finances into present-value balance. The alternatives include immediate tax increases, eliminating the ceiling on taxable payroll, immediate and sustained benefit cuts, raising the system?s normal retirement age, switching from wage to price indexing in calculating benefits, and limiting the price indexing of benefits. The choices made among these and other alternatives have important consequences for which postwar generations (and which of ...
Journal Article
The effect of war expenditures on U.S. output
A study of how war-related temporary increases in government expenditures affect real interest rates and output, with particular emphasis on the probable fiscal effects of the Persian Gulf War.
Journal Article
Government consumption, taxation, and economic activity
The authors use a stylized model of the economy to analyze how permanent and temporary increases in government expenditure--and the timing of taxation used to finance them--affect aggregate output and other variables that describe the economy.
Working Paper
What does the capital income tax distort?
In addition to taxing future consumption (including leisure), capital income taxation subsidizes the consumption of durables. the taxation of future consumption may be characterized as an intertemporal distortion, while the subsidy to durables may be characterized as a static distortion. the magnitude of this intertemporal distortion has received considerable attention, but few analyses have dealt with the static distortion. ; This paper decomposes the excess burden arising from capital income taxation into its static and intertemporal components. the analysis is based on a life-cycle model ...
Working Paper
Social security and Medicare policy from the perspective of generational accounting
An application of the generational accounting method of fiscal policy analysis to projected spending paths for Social Security and Medicare suggesting that, under realistic assumptions for these programs, future generations as well as current young Americans could bear a significantly larger share of the burden of government spending than previously thought.
Journal Article
Should social security be privatized?
An examination of the rationale for public pension programs, a look at how the current U.S. Social Security system evolved, and an analysis of the issues surrounding privatization.
Journal Article
A simple proposal for privatizing Social Security
An argument that shifting to a privatized, funded and contribution-based Social Security system could provide undiminished benefits to current retirees while simultaneously preserving the promise of a secure retirement for today's workers and their descendants.