Julie Zissimopoulos

The effects of subjective survival on retirement and Social Security claiming

This research examines the relationship between mortality risk and retirement, and mortality risk and the propensity to take early and reduced Social Security benefits. The main theory for understanding saving behavior is the life-cycle model (LCH). The LCH, however, can be extended to find the optimal retirement age, and can be used to make predictions about the desire to annuitize or equivalently, the desire to delay claiming Social Security benefits. According to the LCH, individuals who expect to be exceptionally long-lived will retire at a later age than individuals who expect to die early because they will need greater wealth to finance more years of retirement. According to almost any model of intertemporal maximization, those who expect to be long lived will see the increase in Social Security benefits that result from retiring at 65 rather than at 62 as being financially advantageous and will, therefore, delay application for benefits until the age of 65. In principle the decision to retire and the decision to take early and reduced benefits are related decisions but not necessarily the same decision. Therefore this study examines both decisions.

Why Wait?: The Effect of Marriage and Childbearing on the Wages of Men and Women

The authors use data from the earlier and later cohorts of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to estimate the effect of marriage and childbearing on wages. Their estimates imply that marriage lowers female wages by between two and four percent in the year of marriage. Marriage also lowers the wage growth of men and women by about two and four percentage points, respectively. A first birth lowers female wages by between two and three percent, but has no effect on wage growth. Male wages are unaffected by childbearing. These findings suggest that early marriage and childbearing can lead to substantial decreases in lifetime earnings.

Employment and Self-employment in the Wake of Hurricane Katrina

We use data from the monthly Current Population Survey to examine the short- and longer-term effects of Hurricane Katrina on the labor market outcomes of prime-age individuals in the most affected states—Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi— and for evacuees in any state. We focus on rates of labor force participation, employment, and unemployment, and we extend prior research by also examining rates of self-employment. With the exception of Mississippi, employment and unemployment one year after the hurricane were at similar rates as the end of 2003. This aggregate pattern of labor market shock and recovery has been observed for other disasters but masks important differences among subgroups. Those evacuated from their residences, even temporarily, were a harder-hit group, and evacuees who had yet to return to their pre-Katrina state up to one year later were hit especially hard; these findings hold even after controlling for differences in observable characteristics. We also find evidence of an important role for self-employment as part of post-disaster labor market recovery, especially for evacuees who did not return. This may result from poor job prospects in the wage and salary sector or new opportunities for starting businesses in the wake of Katrina.

Sex and Race Differences in the Association Between Statin Use and the Incidence of Alzheimer Disease

Importance To our knowledge, no effective treatments exist for Alzheimer disease, and new molecules are years away. However, several drugs prescribed for other conditions have been associated with reducing its risk. Objective To analyze the association between statin exposure and Alzheimer disease incidence among Medicare beneficiaries. Design, Setting, and Participants We examined the medical and pharmacy claims of a 20% sample of Medicare beneficiaries from 2006 to 2013 and compared rates of Alzheimer disease diagnosis for 399 979 statin users 65 years of age or older with high or low exposure to statins and with drug molecules for black, Hispanic, and non-Hispanic white people, and men and women of Asian, Native American, or unkown race/ethnicity who are referred to as “other.” Main Outcomes and Measures The main outcome was incident diagnosis of Alzheimer disease based on the International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification. We used Cox proportional hazard models to analyze the association between statin exposure and Alzheimer disease diagnosis for different sexes, races and ethnicities, and statin molecules. Results The 399 979 study participants included 7794 (1.95%) black men, 24 484 (6.12%) black women, 11 200 (2.80%) Hispanic men, 21 458 (5.36%) Hispanic women, 115 059 (28.77%) white men, and 195 181 (48.80%) white women. High exposure to statins was associated with a lower risk of Alzheimer disease diagnosis for women (hazard ratio [HR], 0.85; 95% CI, 0.82-0.89; P<.001) and men (HR, 0.88; 95% CI, 0.83-0.93; P<.001). Simvastatin was associated with lower Alzheimer disease risk for white women (HR, 0.86; 95% CI, 0.81-0.92; P<.001), white men (HR, 0.90; 95% CI, 0.82-0.99; P=.02), Hispanic women (HR, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.68-0.99; P=.04), Hispanic men (HR, 0.67; 95% CI, 0.50-0.91; P=.01), and black women (HR, 0.78; 95% CI, 0.66-0.93; P=.005). Atorvastatin was associated with a reduced risk of incident Alzheimer disease diagnosis for white women (HR, 0.84, 95% CI, 0.78-0.89), black women (HR, 0.81, 95% CI, 0.67-0.98), and Hispanic men (HR, 0.61, 95% CI, 0.42-0.89) and women (HR, 0.76, 95% CI, 0.60-0.97). Pravastatin and rosuvastatin were associated with reduced Alzheimer disease risk for white women only (HR, 0.82, 95% CI, 0.70-0.95 and HR, 0.81, 95% CI, 0.67-0.98, respectively). High statin exposure was not associated with a statistically significant lower Alzheimer disease risk among black men. Conclusions and Relevance The reduction in Alzheimer disease risk varied across statin molecules, sex, and race/ethnicity. Clinical trials that include racial and ethnic groups need to confirm these findings. Because statins may affect Alzheimer disease risk, physicians should consider which statin is prescribed to each patient.

Marital Histories and Economic Well-Being

Using panel data from the Health and Retirement Study the authors analyze the impact of a lifetime of marriage events on wealth levels near retirement. They find that unmarried widowed and divorced men and remarried men with more than one past marital disruption have lower housing wealth than continuously married men and women. Both financial and housing wealth are lower for the same marital categories of women. Each year spent married increases wealth by 4 percent. Observable differences in lifetime earnings, pension and Social Security wealth are not enough to explain the large differences in wealth accumulation across marital groups.

The Value of Delaying Alzheimer’s Disease Onset

Abstract Alzheimer’s disease (AD) extracts a heavy societal toll. The value of medical advances that delay onset of AD could be significant. Using data from nationally representative samples from the Health and Retirement Study (1998–2008) and Aging Demographics and Memory Study (2001–2009), we estimate the prevalence and incidence of AD and the formal and informal health care costs associated with it. We use microsimulation to project future prevalence and costs of AD under different treatment scenarios. We find from 2010 to 2050, the number of individuals ages 70+ with AD increases 153%, from 3.6 to 9.1 million, and annual costs increase from

Intervivos Giving Over the Lifecycle

307 billion (

Unequal Giving: Monetary Gifts to Children Across Countries and Over Time

181B formal,

Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, and Self-Employment: The Case of Older Workers

126B informal costs) to

Medical Expenditure Measures in the Health and Retirement Study.

1.5 trillion. 2010 annual per person costs were