ECON21SI
SAVING SOCIAL SECURITY: Proposals for Reform
STANFORD
UNIVERSITY, SPRING QUARTER 2006, 1-2 UNITS, C/NC
Tuesdays, 4:15-5:30PM,
Bldg 200 Rm 217
Instructor:
Sean Arenson, Sponsor: Prof. John
Shoven
Course Syllabus
Course Description:
Social Security is the
Federal government's single largest program, and also one of its most
controversial. With benefit payments scheduled to exceed revenue by 2017
and recent revelations that reform may not even appear on the domestic
agenda until 2009, the future of one of the most popular federal
programs in history is in serious jeopardy, and the cohort that stands
to lose the most is today's college students of Generation Y. This
course will examine the demographic and political factors that have put
Social Security in this precarious position, and the broad menu of
reform options that face policymakers today.
Additional Information:
This course is designed to provide a
politically neutral, in-depth look at the Social Security program and
the problems that it faces in the near future. A major focus of
the course will be analysis of proposals for reform in terms of the
program's function and financing and in the context of the other social
insurance and social welfare programs currently in place.
This course will feature guest lectures
from esteemed Social Security scholars including Professor John Shoven,
who teaches a Sophomore College class on Social Security and has written
several books and articles on the subject, Professor John Cogan, who
served on President Bush’s Committee to Strengthen Social Security, and
others. See the right side of this page for more information.
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Covered Topics:
Here is a partial list of topics
that will be covered throughout the course. On the first class
session, I will survey class members on their areas of interest so I can
better tailor the course. A more complete syllabus will be posted
at the start of the quarter.
- Basics of Social Security.
What is it and why does it exist?
- “The Crisis." What is
the "Social Security crisis" that keeps popping up in the news? How
did it arise and how serious is it?
- Options for Reform. What
are the basic options for reform that face policymakers today?
We will analyze the viability and desirability of several of the
most popular proposals.
- Private/Personal Accounts.
What are they and why are they so controversial?
- Non-Social Security Programs.
How does Social Security differ from and complement other programs
currently in place such as employer-based retirement plans, IRAs,
annuities, Medicare, welfare, etc.
- Stocks and Equities. What
is their role in the Social Security problem how can they be used to
help get us out of it?
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Expectations and Workload:
This class is designed to be as
flexible as possible in order to accommodate the demanding lifestyle of
a Stanford student. That is why it is being offered for 1-2 units
of credit - there are no additional requirements for 2 units, so choose
the units that best fit your course load. That is also why
it is being offered for Credit/No Credit - as long as you meet some
basic requirements, you will pass the class, so you can put as much or
as little into the class as you desire.
There are two basic requirements:
One is that you attend most of the
lectures, especially those with guest speakers. Since there will
only be 9 lectures and this course is primarily lecture and discussion
based, missing many sessions will render it significantly less useful to
you, and will disrupt the class's progress. Since space is
limited, students who commit to attend the majority of lectures (but not
necessarily every single one) will be given priority. Still, I
will make every effort to accommodate you, so please let me know if you have any questions or
concerns.
The other requirement is that you complete two
short written assignments over the course of the quarter. One will
be about a page in length and the other will be a few pages, and again,
you can put as much effort into these as fits your schedule and
interest as long as you complete them.
Since this class is so flexible, the
adage "you get as much out as you put in" will have some relevance.
Therefore, suggested readings will be provided each week on the topic of
the following week's lecture. Completing these short readings will
enhance your experience and the quality of the discussions, so while
they will be optional, my hope is that you will be interested enough in
the topic to find time to read them. These readings will be especially
beneficial prior to guest lectures as the readings will be chosen by the
guests.
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Additional
Questions or Concerns?
Thank you for your interest in this
class. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please email me at
smarenson@stanford.
If you are considering taking the class but are still undecided, I
encourage you to attend the first class session and register on
Axess for Econ21SI so I can send you
additional information prior to the start of the quarter.
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Guest Lecturers
This course will feature guest lectures
from several esteemed Social Security scholars. Here is a quick
preview.
John Shoven
John Cogan
Shripad Tuljapurkar
Additional Speakers TBA
Professor
John B. Shoven
John B. Shoven is the Wallace R. Hawley Director of the
Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, the Charles R. Schwab
Professor of Economics at Stanford University, the Buzz and Barbara
McCoy Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a research associate
of the National Bureau of Economic Research. He specializes in public
finance and corporate finance and has published on social security,
corporate and personal taxation, mutual funds, pension plans and applied
general equilibrium economics.
Shoven has been at Stanford since 1973, serving as chairman of the
economics department from 1986 to 1989, director of the Center for
Economic Policy Research from 1989 to 1993, and dean of the School of
Humanities and Sciences from 1993 to 1998. Shoven served as a consultant
for the U.S. Treasury Department from 1975 to 1988. The author of more
than one hundred professional articles and eighteen books, notably The
Real Deal: The History and Future of Social Security, he has been a
visiting professor at Harvard University, the London School of
Economics, Kyoto University, and Monash University. In 1995 he was
elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Shoven
earned a B.A. in Physics from University of California, San Diego and a
Ph.D in Economics from Yale University.
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Professor John F. Cogan
John F. Cogan is the Leonard and Shirley
Ely Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a professor in the
Public Policy Program at Stanford University, where he has had a
continuing appointment since 1980. Cogan is an expert in domestic policy. His current research is
focused on U.S. budget and fiscal policy, social security, and health
care. He has published widely in professional journals in both economics
and political science.
At Stanford, he currently serves on faculty advisory boards for the
Stanford-in-Washington campus and the Stanford Institute for Economic
Policy Research. He received Stanford-in-Government's Distinguished
Service Award in 1994.
Cogan has devoted a considerable part of his career to public
service. He served as assistant secretary for policy in the U.S.
Department of Labor from 1981 to 1983. From 1983 to 1986, he served as
an associate director in the U.S. Office of Management and Budget; first
as associate director for economics and government and subsequently as
associate director for human resources. His responsibilities included
development and review of all health, housing, education, and employment
training programs and policies. In 1988–89, he served as deputy director
of OMB.
Cogan has served on numerous congressional and presidential advisory
commissions. He is currently a member of Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger's Council of Economic Advisers. Most recently, he served
on President George W. Bush's Commission to Strengthen Social Security.
He has also served as a member of the U.S. Bipartisan Commission on
Health Care (the Pepper Commission), the Social Security Notch
Commission, the National Academy of Sciences' Panel on Poverty and
Family Assistance, the Congressional Budget Office's Panel of Economic
Advisers, the Congressional Policy Advisory Committee, and California
governor Pete Wilson's Council of Economic Advisers. During the 2000
presidential campaign he served as a senior economic adviser to George
W. Bush on issues relating to tax, budget, and Social Security policy.
Following the 2000 presidential election, he directed President Bush's
budget transition team. In 2005, Cogan was appointed to the board of
directors of Gilead Sciences.
Cogan received his A.B. in 1969 and his Ph.D in 1976 from the
University of California at Los Angeles, both in economics. He was an
associate economist at the Rand Corporation from 1975 to 1980. In 1979,
Cogan was appointed a national fellow at the Hoover Institution; in 1980
he was appointed a senior research fellow; and in 1984 he became a
senior fellow.
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Professor
Shripad Tuljapurkar
Shripad Tuljapurkar is a demographer and ecologist, and is President
of Mountain View Research Inc., a company that does research and
software development in the population sciences. Tuljapurkar is also a
Consulting Professor at Stanford University and a Member of the Center
for the Economics and Demography of Aging at the University of
California, Berkeley. He has held full-time academic appointments at
both these universities. Tuljapurkar is the Chair of a new committee of
the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population, focusing
on the topic “Population Age Structure and Related Policy Issues.” He is
the 1996 recipient of the Mindel Sheps award of the Population
Association of America for work in formal demography and demographic
methodology, and was named a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellow for
1998-1999.
Tuljapurkar’s research covers work on areas relevant to the Social
Security system, including analyses of the determinants and dynamics of
mortality change, the dynamics of populations subject to stochastic and
nonlinear changes in vital rates, the stochastic forecasting of
populations structured by age and sex, and the analysis of risk in
multiple-objective decision problems. Tuljapurkar has served on numerous
scientific committees: he was a member of the Social Sciences and
Population Study Section of the National Institutes of Health from 1987
to 1992, and of the Population Biology panel of the National Science
Foundation from 1992 to 1995. He is on the editorial boards of the
journals Mathematical Population Studies and Anthropological Science,
and previously served for four years on the editorial boards of the
journals Mathematical Population Studies and Anthropological Science,
and previously served for four years on the editorial board of the
journal Theoretical Population Biology. He is the author or co-author of
numerous scientific papers and two scientific books.
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