Tag: health
Abstract Although health and employment shocks are fairly common at older ages and often derail retirement savings plans, Social Security’s disability insurance, spouse and survivor benefits, and progressive benefit formula may provide important protections. By contrast, traditional employer-sponsored pension benefits may be especially vulnerable to health and employment shocks immediately before benefit take-up, because pension…
Introduction Most of the discussion of retirement security focuses on declining Social Security replacement rates, modest 401(k) balances, the low level of saving, and longer life expectancy. Rising health care costs, which seem too amorphous to incorporate into numerical examples, are often characterized as a “wildcard” that could undermine the best laid plans. This brief…
