Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Budget. Task Force on Entitlements, Uncontrollables, and IndexingPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Civil service
Languages : en
Pages : 204
Book Description
Options for Changing Indexation of Entitlement Programs
Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Budget. Task Force on Entitlements, Uncontrollables, and IndexingPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Civil service
Languages : en
Pages : 204
Book Description
Budget Options
Author: United States. Congressional Budget OfficePublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Budget
Languages : en
Pages : 240
Book Description
Automatic Government
Author: R. Kent WeaverPublisher: Brookings Institution Press
ISBN: 0815704011
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 289
Book Description
One of the most dramatic and least studied policy changes of the past twenty years is the increased use of indexing—automatic adjustments for inflation—in federal programs. Currently, programs comprising more than one-third of the federal budget have indexing provisions. The growth of indexing is all the more remarkable since it appears to conflict with the electoral interests of most politicians. Without indexing, legislators can vote for popular increases in social security benefits, federal pay, and other programs during election years and claim credit with their constituents for doing so. Indexing tends to keep such votes off the agenda. Why would politicians renounce these credit-claiming opportunities instead of embracing them? R. Kent Weaver examines the reasons for the growth of indexing in federal programs and its consequences for current policy. He focuses on indexing debates in six policy areas: social security, food stamps, congressional pay, dairy price supports, the minimum wage, and federal income tax brackets. Weaver argues that to understand indexation policy—and policymaking in general—we must broaden our understanding of policymakers' motivations. They have often given up opportunities to claim credit because they are even more concerned with avoiding blame for unpopular decisions and outcomes. Politicians' efforts to avoid blame for unpopular actions not only have determined whether indexing proposals were adopted, but have also shaped the effects of indexing on programs where it was adopted. Weaver shows that the effects of indexing have varied substantially across programs, and he suggests guidelines for the future use of indexing in federal programs.
Monthly Catalogue, United States Public Documents
Author: Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Government publications
Languages : en
Pages : 748
Book Description
Monthly Catalog of United States Government Publications
Author: Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Government publications
Languages : en
Pages : 974
Book Description
Non-means-tested Entitlements
Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Budget. Task Force on Entitlements, Uncontrollables, and IndexingPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Medicare
Languages : en
Pages : 242
Book Description
Reducing the Deficit, Spending and Revenue Options
Author: Economic Overview
Author: United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on AppropriationsPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Budget
Languages : en
Pages : 592
Book Description
What Can be Done to Check the Growth of Federal Entitlement and Indexed Spending?
Author: United States. General Accounting OfficePublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Government spending policy
Languages : en
Pages : 50
Book Description
The Growing Gap in Life Expectancy by Income
Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and MedicinePublisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 030931710X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 243
Book Description
The U.S. population is aging. Social Security projections suggest that between 2013 and 2050, the population aged 65 and over will almost double, from 45 million to 86 million. One key driver of population aging is ongoing increases in life expectancy. Average U.S. life expectancy was 67 years for males and 73 years for females five decades ago; the averages are now 76 and 81, respectively. It has long been the case that better-educated, higher-income people enjoy longer life expectancies than less-educated, lower-income people. The causes include early life conditions, behavioral factors (such as nutrition, exercise, and smoking behaviors), stress, and access to health care services, all of which can vary across education and income. Our major entitlement programs - Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and Supplemental Security Income - have come to deliver disproportionately larger lifetime benefits to higher-income people because, on average, they are increasingly collecting those benefits over more years than others. This report studies the impact the growing gap in life expectancy has on the present value of lifetime benefits that people with higher or lower earnings will receive from major entitlement programs. The analysis presented in The Growing Gap in Life Expectancy by Income goes beyond an examination of the existing literature by providing the first comprehensive estimates of how lifetime benefits are affected by the changing distribution of life expectancy. The report also explores, from a lifetime benefit perspective, how the growing gap in longevity affects traditional policy analyses of reforms to the nation's leading entitlement programs. This in-depth analysis of the economic impacts of the longevity gap will inform debate and assist decision makers, economists, and researchers.