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INTEREST GROUPS AT-A-GLANCE
Wednesday, January 28, 2015, 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM
National Press Club

Participants chose between two concurrent interest groups designed to gather both Academy members and non-members around the major communities of interest within NASI’s purview – primarily income and retirement security and health policy.

  1. Income Security Policy: Retirement Income at Home and Abroad
  2. Health Policy: Persistent Barriers to Reform of the American Health Care System

Retirement Income at Home and Abroad

Income security in retirement is a global concern. This session will explore retirement income security in two panels. The first explores challenges in the United States and options to enhance retirement security. The second broadens the scope to examine retirement security in the United States compared to other OECD countries as well as pension reforms in various parts of the world, and implications for future retirement income policy worldwide.

Panel 1:  Two Views on Strengthening U.S. Retirement Security

  • Andrew Eschtruth, Associate Director for External Relations, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College: co-author of Falling Short: The Coming Retirement Crisis and What to Do About it (published December 2014)
  • Nancy Altman, Co-Director, Social Security Works; Eric Kingson, Co-Director, Social Security Works: co-authors of Social Security Works! Why It Isn’t Going Broke and How Expanding It Will Help Us All
  • Moderator: Kilolo Kijakazi, Institute Fellow, Urban Institute
  • Discussants: Sarah Holden, Senior Director of Retirement and Investor Research, Investment Company Institute; Stephen Gorin, Professor of Social Work, Plymouth State University

Panel 2:  Insights from Abroad

  • Elaine Fultz, Social Security Department, International Labour Organization (retired): How Does the U.S. Measure Up with Other OECD Countries?
  • Anita Schwarz, Lead Economist, Social Protection and Labor Practice, World Bank: The Inverting Pyramid: Providing Old Age Security in a Challenging Demographic Environment
  • Moderator: Larry Thompson, Former Social Security Executive and International Pension Consultant
  • Discussants: Carmelo Mesa-Lago, Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics and Latin American Studies, University of Pittsburgh; Emily Andrews, Development Economist, Consultant

Persistent Barriers to Reform of the American Health Care System – a Colloquy

The goal of achieving universal, efficient, and effective health care with a high level of public acceptance has been pursued for over a hundred years in the United States. Yet, despite significant incremental progress (notably through the passage of Medicare, Medicaid and, most recently, the Affordable Care Act), we remain far from that goal. This session will address the question: “Why has achievement of the goal of universal health care been so hard in the United States?” Even if the stated goals of the ACA are achieved, many Americans will remain left behind and many more will face daunting financial and other barriers to care. The session will include short presentations by a group of national health care experts followed by a series of structured conversations among panelists, and between panelists and the public. Questions will be encouraged, and follow-up questions and comments will be permitted under guidelines intended to keep the discussion focused and moving along. We hope to have a free-ranging and candid discussion of the technical, cultural and political barriers to further health care reform in the United States.

Participants: 

  • Moderator: Philip Caper, MD, Health Policy columnist, Bangor Daily News, Board member, Physicians for a National Health Program and Maine AllCare.
  • Theodore Marmor, Professor Emeritus of Public Policy and Management & Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Yale School of Management
  • Marcia Angell, Senior Lecturer in Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School and former Editor in Chief, The New England Journal of Medicine 
  • Merton Bernstein, Walter D. Coles Professor of Law Emeritus, Washington University of Law
  • Donald Berwick, Former Administrator, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS)
  • Laurence Seidman, Chaplin Tyler Professor of Economics, University of Delaware
  • Joseph Antos, Wilson H. Taylor Scholar in Health Care and Retirement Policy, American Enterprise Institute (AEI)
  • Joseph White, Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director of the Center for Policy Studies, Case Western Reserve University

►See more “Persistent Barriers to Reform of the American Health Care System — a Colloquy”