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How accurate are older people's expectations about their future Social Security benefits? Using panel data from the Health and Retirement Study, we compare respondents' observed Social Security claiming ages and benefits with subjective expectations provided during their 50s and early 60s. We find that, while older adults generally have accurate expectations about their claiming age, they underestimate their annual Social Security income by approximately $1,896 (11.5%) on average. However, both accuracy and precision increase with age, and the forecast error for people in their early 60s is not statistically different from zero. Exploiting plausibly exogenous variation in the mailing of Social Security statements, which contain personalized information about future benefits, we show that information provision reduces the forecast error in annual income by $344 (2.1% of the average benefit). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate how state "Auto‐IRA" mandates affect firm offerings of employer‐sponsored retirement plans (ESRPs). These policies require firms without ESRPs to facilitate automatic employee contributions to state‐created individual retirement accounts. We find that these policies increase an individual's probability of working for a firm with an ESRP by 6%–9% and of being included in the ESRP by 8%–13%. At the firm level, these policies increase the probability of offering an ESRP by 7%, the probability of establishing a new ESRP by 41%–44%, and the number of ESRP participants by 6 percent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate the impact of a 2005 policy that provided more generous terms for delaying state pensions in the United Kingdom. First, we find that the policy reduced the fraction of males and possibly females receiving pensions at the earliest eligibility age and shortly thereafter. This shift affected cohorts who became eligible for state pensions at or after the policy change. Second, the policy is associated with increases in male and female labor supply around the earliest pension eligibility age, consistent with some individuals working longer to finance pension delay. However, further analysis suggests that these labor supply changes are more likely to reflect longer-term trends across birth cohorts rather than a causal effect of the policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the effect of retirement on health behaviors using three nationally representative U.S. datasets. Findings show a decrease in drinking at the intensive margin, particularly for males. Individuals change their composition of exercise behaviors upon retirement, with varying effects of retirement depending on exercise intensity and gender. Dining patterns also change, with changes in eating out among men and more time spent on food preparation. Finally, although retirement increases time spent watching TV and movies as well as time spent sleeping, it reduces overall sedentary time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) to examine how labour supply changes around divorces that occur later in life. We find that the probability of work and hours worked increase for women, but decline for men, with evidence of an anticipation effect for men. We find weak evidence of a post-divorce decline in per-capita wealth and stronger evidence of a decline in per-capita non-own-wage income for women, but not for men. While not causal, these findings are consistent with income and possibly wealth effects driving the post-divorce increase in women's labour supply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the role of self-employment in retirement transitions using a panel of administrative tax data. We find that the hazard of self-employment increases at popular retirement ages associated with Social Security eligibility, particularly for those with greater retirement wealth. Late-career transitions to self-employment are associated with a larger drop in income than similar mid-career transitions. Data from the Health and Retirement Study suggest that hours worked also fall upon switching to self-employment. These results suggest that self-employment at older ages may serve as a 'bridge job,' allowing workers to gradually reduce hours and earnings along the pathway to retirement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the connection between taxes paid and benefits accrued under the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) program on both the intensive and extensive margins. We perform these calculations for stylized workers given the existing benefit structure and disability hazard rates. On the intensive margin, we examine the effect of an additional dollar of earnings on the marginal payroll taxes contributed and future benefits earned. We find that the present discounted value of disability benefits received from an additional dollar of earnings, net of the SSDI payroll tax, generally declines with age, becoming negative around age 40 and reaching almost zero at age 63. On the extensive margin, we determine the effect of working an additional year on the additional payroll taxes and future benefits as a percentage of income. The return to working an additional year at an income level just large enough to earn Social Security credits for the year is large and positive through age 60. However, the return to working an additional full year is substantially smaller and becomes negative at approximately age 57. Thus, older workers face strong incentives to earn enough to obtain creditable coverage through age 60, but they face disincentives for additional earnings. In addition, workers aged 61 and older face work disincentives at any level of earnings. We repeat this analysis for stylized workers at different levels of earnings and find that, while the program transfers resources from high earners to low earners, the workers experience similar patterns in the returns to working. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]