Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/217113 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Citation: 
[Journal:] Quantitative Economics [ISSN:] 1759-7331 [Volume:] 9 [Issue:] 2 [Publisher:] The Econometric Society [Place:] New Haven, CT [Year:] 2018 [Pages:] 707-733
Publisher: 
The Econometric Society, New Haven, CT
Abstract: 
Spousal and survivor pensions are two important provisions of the US Social Security pension system. In this paper, we assess the impact of these benefits on the female employment rate in the context of a full life-cycle model in which households decide on female labor supply and savings. One important aspect of our model is that we allow for returns to labor market experience so that participation decisions affect not only current earnings and Social Security pension eligibility but also future earnings. We quantify the effect on female labor supply and on household inequality of (i) removing spousal benefit, (ii) removing both spousal and survivor pension benefits, and (iii) extending from 35 to 40 the number of periods of the working career that are considered when calculating the retired worker's pension. We find that reforms (i) and (ii) significantly increase female employment throughout the life cycle, whereas reform (iii) has a very mild effect. The effect of (ii) on income inequality in older household is large, whereas the effect on consumption inequality is small. All three reforms have substantial effects on Social Security expenditure and fiscal revenues.
Subjects: 
Social Security
Spousal and Survivor Benefits
Women's Labor Market Participation
JEL: 
D15
H55
J22
J24
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by-nc Logo
Document Type: 
Article

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