An overview of American Indians and Alaska Natives in the context of Social Security and Supplemental Security Income.

This article examines the economic security of the American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) population by exploring AIAN receipt of Social Security benefits and Supplemental Security Income (SSI). This analysis uses data from the 2005-2009 American Community Survey Public Use Microdata Sample, which provides a larger AIAN sample size than many other sources, thereby enabling more reliable estimates. We find that adult AIANs are less likely to receive Social Security benefits and more likely to receive SSI than are adults in the total population.

Lowering social security's duration-of-marriage requirement: distributional effects for future female retirees.

A number of alternatives to Social Security's auxiliary benefit system have been proposed in the context of changes in American family and work patterns. This article focuses on one modification therein-lowering the 10-year duration-of-marriage requirement for divorced spouses. Using a powerful microsimulation model (MINT), we examine the distributional effects of extending spouse and survivor benefit eligibility to 5- and 7-year marriages ending in divorce among female retirees in 2030, a population largely comprised of baby boomers.

An overview of the Railroad Retirement program.

In the 1930s, amidst concern about the ability of existing pension programs to provide former railroad workers with adequate assistance in old age, Congress established a national Railroad Retirement system. This system is primarily administered by the Railroad Retirement Board (RRB), which is an independent federal agency charged with providing benefits to eligible employees of the railroad industry and their families. Today, the Railroad Retirement program is closely tied to the far better-known Social Security program, and although the Railroad Retirement program and Social Security share a number of common elements, key differences also exist between the two in areas such as funding and benefit structure.