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Retirement and Retirement Benefits

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Retirement and the provision of pensions and retirement benefits impact individuals, the private sector, community services, and nationalized health systems like Medicare. RAND has made policy-relevant contributions in developing and developed nations in the area of retirement research, including modeling future retirement trends, analyzing the determinants and health impacts of retirement, and understanding retirement consumption behavior.

Commentary
Reframing Retirement
Retirement is a fluid concept. Many retirees would consider returning to the workforce if conditions were right and they could set their own pace. A reframing of the aging and retirement process would allow us to see the issue in a new way.
Aug 9, 2021
Research Brief
Nearly Half of Retirees Would Return to Work
Overall, older workers report having more meaningful work and more workplace flexibility than their younger peers. Nearly half of retirees say they would return to work under the right conditions—and a large number already have.
Nov 12, 2019

Explore Retirement and Retirement Benefits

Tool
RAND HRS Longitudinal File 2020 (V1) Documentation: Includes 1992-2020 (Early Release)
This tool is a cleaned, easy-to-use, and streamlined data product containing information from the Health and Retirement Study, a longitudinal household survey that facilitates research into different aspects of population aging in the United States.
Apr 13, 2023
Report
Improving Transition Assistance for Reserve Component Members
The authors identify unmet needs for transitioning reserve component members, assess the Transition Assistance Program (TAP), and recommend ways to improve TAP's effectiveness in addressing reserve component members' transition needs.
Apr 12, 2023
Journal Article
Understanding Decision Making Around Changing the State Pension Age: A Review of International Evidence
This report presents findings from a review commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions to investigate how high-income OECD countries change State Pension age (SPa) and the variables considered when they changed the SPa.
Apr 5, 2023
Journal Article
Teacher Pensions: An Overview
In this special issue of Educational Researcher, we present research on a variety of policy issues surrounding teacher pensions.
Mar 8, 2023
Report
Americans' Spending Declines Consistently After Age 65
Americans' personal spending drops consistently after age 65, both among the affluent and those with lower levels of financial resources. The findings contradict traditional wisdom that spending will be constant or even increase during older age, and suggests that individuals and couples could spend more early in retirement.
Dec 5, 2022
Journal Article
Saving Regret and Procrastination
Saving regret, or the wish in hindsight to have saved more earlier in life, is widespread in older populations. Little of the variation is explained by procrastination and psychological factors. Unemployment, health, and divorce are larger factors.
Nov 23, 2022
Journal Article
Pathways to Retirement Among Dual Earning Couples
This paper examines the transition from full-time work to fully retired among dual earning couples, which we call joint retirement trajectories. We analyze 12 waves of the Health and Retirement Study to map out the distribution of potential pathways that couples undertake when retiring.
Apr 21, 2022
Report
Recouping Separation Pay from U.S. Service Members and Veterans Who Later Receive Veterans Affairs Disability Compensation
The authors study how many service members and veterans experience recoupment -- or withholding -- of U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs compensation due to receipt of military separation pay and how much more money they would receive but for recoupment.
Feb 7, 2022
Journal Article
A Dynamic Behavioral Model of Korean Saving, Work, and Benefit Claiming Decisions
We develop a model that captures elements of the South Korean National Pension Scheme and behavioral responses in labor supply, savings and benefit claiming to changes in the public pension system using a sample of married couples nearing retirement.
Dec 21, 2021
Journal Article
How Did the Reintroduction of the Social Security Statement Change Workers' Expectations and Plans?
This study fielded a survey in RAND's American Life Panel, coinciding with the partial reintroduction of the Social Security Statement. The findings indicate that regular mailings can play a role in shaping workers' retirement plans.
Mar 3, 2021
Journal Article
Financial Literacy and Financial Decision-Making at Older Ages
This paper examines how financial literacy is associated with three types of financial decisions pertinent to older individuals: adherence to timely credit card repayment, stock market participation, and risk diversification of household assets.
Feb 9, 2021
Report
RAND Behavioral Finance Forum: Financial Security Over the Lifespan
Video compilation of the 2020 Behavioral Finance Forum (BeFi). Leaders from academia, government, regulatory agencies, and industry were invited to share the latest research and exchange ideas on the theme of financial security over the lifespan.
Feb 2, 2021
Journal Article
The Effects of Job Characteristics on Retirement
We present results from a survey fielded in the RAND American Life Panel. The survey queried older workers about their current,desired, and expected job characteristics, and about how certain characteristics would affect their retirement decisions.
Sep 29, 2020
Journal Article
Parents with an Unemployed Adult Child: Consumption, Income, and Savings Effects
In this paper, we directly approach the potential costs, inefficiencies, and inequities of aiding family members.
Sep 17, 2020
Commentary
A Tale of Two Americas
Economic pain in the United States is obvious and palpable everywhere except in the stock market. This spotlights inequality that has been increasing for decades. Undoing disparities will require firm policy commitment over many years.
Jul 9, 2020
Commentary
Reactivating Retirees for Police Service in Times of Crisis
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, an increasing number of police officers and deputies have been exposed to or tested positive for the coronavirus. Gaps in personnel coverage could be filled by easing restrictions on the hiring of retired police officers rather than relying on existing resources.
Apr 21, 2020
Journal Article
A Double Safety Net? Understanding Interactions Between Disability Benefits, Formal Assistance, and Family Support
This work brings together perspectives on household adjustments in response to a major health shock in the U.S. It concludes that the family plays a key role in insuring against health shocks, and that informal and formal assistance are imperfect substitutes for one another.
Feb 7, 2020
Journal Article
Does Home Production Replace Consumption Spending? Evidence from Shocks in Housing Wealth in the Great Recession
This paper sheds new light on the importance of home production in welfare analyses by focusing on the elasticity of substitution estimated over the retired population, thus holding constant non-work time, but also on the share of spending that is potentially substitutable.
Sep 20, 2019

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Research conducted by

Researcher Spotlight

Erik Meijer

Adjunct Economist

Erik Meijer is an adjunct economist at RAND. Much of his current research is in the economics of aging: health, cognition, Social Security, retirement, saving, and investment. Recent and ongoing work includes studying cross-country differences in health and cognition, the effects of retirement…
Jeffrey B. Wenger

Senior Policy Researcher

Jeffrey B. Wenger (he/his) is a senior policy researcher and director of the RAND Lowy Family Middle-Class Pathways Center (MCPC). As director of the Middle-Class Pathways Center he works with RAND researchers and other scholars documenting the challenges of remaining in the middle class and…

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