Exploring Special Provisions and Future Projections in Policy and Planning
This course is designed to give the students a background in Social Security for their personal and professional needs. It shows how the program has been expanded from a retirement payment to a worker leaving the workforce due to old age to a massive insurance program that covers spouses and other dependents. Included is an explanation that is prevalent in current non-professional literature that is misleading to the public, and what the students should know to clarify the misstatement for themselves or their clients. Factors that are necessary to determine a Social Security benefit and the formulas for how those factors are determined are discussed.Â
It discusses the Full Retirement Age (FRA) with the associated benefit and the reduction formula for earlier-age retirement and the increased benefit due to a Delayed Retirement Credit for retirement later than the FRA. The procedure for determining spousal benefits is also discussed. A thorough presentation of Breakeven is given to help the student decide or advise a client when to take advantage of benefits. The probabilities of surviving to the breakeven ages are shown.Â
Two relatively unknown topics, the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Pension Offset, are discussed, in addition to the current consensus and projections for the future of the Social Security program touched upon.
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Social Security and Retirment Planning Expert, PhD
My professional career began as a Mechanical Engineer. After being released from active duty from miliary service during the Korean War, I utilized the GI Bill and majored in the topic at the University of Rhode Island following up with a master’s degree the following year. University teaching looked appealing, so I applied for and received a position on the civilian faculty at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. Policy changes required that in order to pursue a career at the Academy, I was required to acquire a Ph.D. and rather than doing it part time by commuting to Washington, D.C. I returned to the University of Rhode Island for full-time study, completing the requirements in 1970. Circumstances precluded my return to the Naval Academy, and I acquired a position on the faculty in the Mathematics Department of a small business college, which has now grown to be Bryant University. The department chair asked if I would develop and teach a course in Mathematics of Finance to which I agreed. After developing and teaching the course I realized that finance (or the mathematics thereof) was the direction I wanted to follow in the future, and my research and publications have been in that genre since then. During my tenure at Bryant University, I served as Chair of the department for 13 years, and as a consequence of having been a consultant to a pension consulting firm, I developed a major in actuarial mathematics. As such I have taught courses in the Theory of Interest, Mathematics of Finance, Insurance, and Pensions, Pension Fundamentals, Software Applications, and Statistics. I have published articles in both referred and non-refereed journals, as well as op-ed pieces on Social Security and bonds. A few of the publications are listed below.
