Description: This 1978 teaching session provided a basic primer on the design of the OASDI benefit formula. Areas covered included: 1. The Decoupling issue 2. The Average Indexed Monthly Earnings 3. The Primary Insurance Amount formula 4. The Indexing procedure 5. Transition arrangements 6. The Short Service problem 7. Replacement Ratio considerations 8. Impact of Wage Base changes 9. The Retirement Age and Retirement Test.

Description: This paper summarizes the legislative activity from 1969-72 with regards to social security. Topics include expansions in Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance [OASDI], establishment of social security trust funds, and changes in Medicare including extensions of benefits to disabled persons. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1973, Vol. 25, Pt. 1, No. 73.

Description: Describes the OASDI / HI changes brought about by the enactment of H.R. 1 in late October of 1972 including modifications for the HMO Act.

Description: This paper discusses decoupling of social security - meaning that the coupling of actual benefits for those already beneficiaries and potential benefits for future beneficiaries be broken. The purposes are to describe the environment, the problem which decoupling addresses and the importance of a rational solution. The paper discusses the wage-indexing approach and the price-indexing approach. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1977, Vol. 29.

Description: Article from The Actuary, April 1986, Volume 20, No. 4 is an editorial on later retirement. There is indication that workers may eventually stay in the work force longer based on the 1983 amendments to the Social Security Act.

Description: This paper presents a procedure for analyzing the factors that affect federal Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance costs in the U.S. This procedure shows that the tripling of the program costs during the last 30 years resulted from increases in the number of beneficiaries as opposed to increases in the number of covered workers. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1986, Vol. 38.

Description: The authors comment on James C. Hickman's paper about the Social Security decoupling issue. Decoupling generally refers to the separation of the procedures used to determine benefits for future recipients from those that adjust benefits for current recipients.

Description: This article is a review and discussion of the 1976 “Report of the Consultant Panel on Social Security to the United States Congressional Research Service.” The report contains the results of another government-initiated study of the OASDI system which puts forth a second solution to a problem first publicly identified by the 1975 Advisory Council on Social Security, a problem which has come to be known as the “decoupling issue.” Because the solution proposed by the actuaries and economists making up this consultant panel is significantly different from that of the Advisory Council, this report has inspired some degree of friendly debate among actuaries and others interested in the technicalities of the OASDI benefit formula. Panel members are Peter A. Diamond, James C. Hickman, Ernest J. Moorhead, and William C. Hsiao, Chairman.

Description: This panel discussion session focuses on the financial security of retirees including examining the role of personal savings in meeting the financial security needs of retirees. From Record of Society of Actuaries 1980, Vol. 6, No. 4.