A treatise that draws inferences about the potential behavorial responses to means testing Social Security by examining the effects of the Supplementary Security Income program for the aged on wealth accumulation and employment.

The elderly are one of the exceptional groups in American society with access to a significant cash safety net, a means-tested program called Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Little attention has been paid to the pre-eligibility-age labor market disincentives created by such a program. In...

Features of the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program and the social security retirement system may interact in a manner that creates incentives for prospective SSI recipients to take social security early retirement (SSER). This paper takes a first close look at this issue. The work...

This paper is the first to analyze eligibility and participation spells and estimate dynamic models of SSI participation by the aged. We first describe eligibility and participation spells and estimate competing-risk models of the determinants of transitions. Next, we present evidence of...

Beginning around 1990, disability rates of children, as reported by their parents, began to increase. At the same time, a major expansion of Medicaid eligibility to children outside of the welfare population was taking place. Data from multiple panels of the Survey of Income and Program...

Previous researchers have noted that the ‘categorical’ Medicaid eligibility accompanying the welfare programs Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) often far exceeds the value of these programs’ cash benefits. It may be the case that the...