COMMENTS ONTHE EFFECT OF HEALTH REFORM ON RETIREMENT

Kevin Whitman

The comments and conclusions in this presentation are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of The Pew Charitable Trusts

Thank You • The Social Security Administration

• NBER

• The authors

My Focus Today• Potential ways to expand the research

• Future directions

Additional Outcomes • The authors focus on retirement and part-time work

• Important outcomes, but older workers may also respond outside of this framework

• A particular concern is self-employment

Self-Employment• Declining among older workers in recent years

Source: Heim (2014) using the 1994-2012 CPS ASEC

Self-Employment• Will health reform reverse this trend?

• Interesting question for the structure of the labor force, but also for retirement security

• There are potential benefits to self-employment, but also risks

The Future• Future research should focus on the future

• Apologies for the tautology

• This study looks at responses in 2014 and early 2015• A short time frame following health reform’s implementation

• There may not have been enough time to see an effect

The Future• The authors are up front in acknowledging this issue

• They note that problems during the open enrollment period and ongoing legal challenges could have made workers cautious

• An additional obstacle: A lack of knowledge

Health Reform Monitoring Survey

Source: Long and Goin (2015)

Take a Ride with Me

• Where we’re going…the policies have stabilized and new (informed) expectations exist

When we Arrive• Let’s assume we see two things

• 1) Hover boards • 2) Health reform having an effect on retirement

• At that point, we should consider not just the aggregate effects, but the characteristics of people changing their connection to the labor force and their outcomes in retirement

Next Steps• Good policy relies on us understanding several things on

a more detailed level, including: • Who’s responding; • How they’re responding; • Why they’re responding; and• What that response means for their economic security

Conclusion• We are at point of significant policy change

• More changes are likely in the next few decades as we address Social Security’s projected funding shortfall

• Research should continue to explore what health reform means for the future • Not only for the labor force in the abstract, but for the people

involved