Gary Burtless
John C. and Nancy D. Whitehead Chair in Economic Studies
The Brookings Institution
Background
Gary Burtless holds the John C. and Nancy D. Whitehead Chair in Economic Studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC. He is also a research associate of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College and of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. His research focuses on issues connected with public finance, aging, saving, labor markets, income distribution, social insurance, and the behavioral effects of government tax and transfer policy.
Burtless graduated from Yale College in 1972 and received a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977. Before coming to Brookings in 1981, he served as an economist in the policy and evaluation offices of the Secretary of Labor and the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare. In 1993 he was Visiting Professor of Public Affairs at the University of Maryland, College Park. He has served as a consultant on pension reform to the World Bank, as an advisor to the U.S. Department of Labor on evaluation policy and social experiments, on technical advisory panels charged with analyzing the status and reform of U.S. Social Security, and as a panel member of the National Academy of Scie nces Committee on the Health and Safety Needs of Older Workers.
Research Projects for the Center for Retirement Research
Completed
"Capital Income Flows and the Relative Well-Being of America's Aged Population" (with Barry P. Bosworth and Sarah E. Anders), Working Paper, #2007-21, December 2007.
"International Investment for Retirement Savers: Historical Evidence on Risk and Returns" Working Paper, #2007-5, February 2007.
"Risk and Reward of International Investing for U.S. Retirement Savers: Historical Evidence" Working Paper, #2006-25, December 2006.
"Cross-National Evidence on the Burden of Age-Related Public Transfers and Health Benefits" Working Paper, #2006-06, February 2006.
"The Age Profile of Income and the Burden of Unfunded Transfers in Four Countries: Evidence from the Luxembourg Income Study" Working Paper, #2005-01, January 2005.
"The Impact of Aging on Financial Markets and the Economy: A Survey"(with Barry Bosworth and Ralph C. Bryant), Working Paper, #2004-23, October 2004.
"Supply-Side Consequences of Social Security Reform: Impacts on Saving and Employment" (with Barry Bosworth), Working Paper, #2004-01, January 2004.
"Implications of the Bush Commission Pension Reforms for Married Couples" (with Barry Bosworth and Benjamin Keys), Working Paper, #2003-03, February 2003.
"Is Working Longer the Answer for an Aging Workforce?" (with Joseph F. Quinn), Issue in Brief #11, December 2002.
"Pension Reform in the Presence of Financial Market Risk" (with Barry Bosworth), Working Paper, #2002-01, July 2002.
"The Trend in Lifetime Earnings Inequality and its Impact on the Distribution of Retirement Income" (with Barry Bosworth and Claudia Sahm), Working Paper, #2001-03, August 2001.
"How Would Financial Risk Affect Retirement Income Under Individual Accounts?" Issue in Brief #5, October 2000.
"Distributional Impact of Social Security Reform" (with Barry Bosworth and Claudia Sahm), Conference Paper, May 2000.
"The Effects of Social Security Reform on Saving, Investment, and the Level and Distribution of Worker Well-Being" (with Barry Bosworth), Working Paper, #2000-02, January 2000.
"Lifetime Earnings Patterns, The Distribution of Future Social Security Benefits and The Impact of Pension Reform" (with Barry Bosworth and Eugene Steuerle), Working Paper, #1999-06, December 1999.
Selected Publications
- Bosworth, Barry P. and Gary Burtless, eds. 1998. Aging Societies: The Global Dimensions. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
- Aaron, Henry J., Barry P. Bosworth, and Gary Burtless. 1989. Can America Afford to Grow Old? Paying for Social Security. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
- Burtless, Gary and Robert Moffitt. 1985. "The Joint Choice of Retirement Date and Post-Retirement Hours of Work." Journal of Labor Economics 16(2).
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