About the National Academy of Social Insurance
The National Academy of Social Insurance is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization made up of the nation’s leading experts on social insurance. Its mission is to advance solutions to challenges facing the nation by increasing public understanding of how social insurance contributes to economic security.
Social insurance encompasses broad-based systems that help workers and their families pool risks to avoid loss of income due to retirement, death, disability, or unemployment, and to ensure access to health care.
The Academy convenes steering committees and study panels that are charged with conducting research, issuing findings, and identifying policy option recommendations based on their analyses. Members of these groups are selected for their recognized expertise and with due consideration for the balance of disciplines and perspectives appropriate to each project.
Board of Directors
Renée M. Landers, Chair
Indivar Dutta-Gupta, Vice Chair
Jason J. Fichtner, Treasurer
Rebecca D. Vallas, Secretary
William J. Arnone, Ex-Officio
Harry J. Conaway
Cecilia A. Conrad
Robert Espinoza
Howard Fluhr
Merrill Alisa Friedman
Alexander W. Hertel-Fernandez
Douglas J. Holtz-Eakin
Josephine Kalipeni
Aparna Mathur
Shaun C. O’Brien
Alaine Perry
Earl R. Pomeroy
William M. Rodgers III
Paul Van de Water
Debra Whitman
Project Staff
William Arnone, Project Director
Chief Executive Officer, National Academy of Social Insurance
Kathryn Edwards, Principal Investigator
Economist, RAND Corporation, and Professor, RAND Pardee Graduate School
Griffin Murphy, Research Assistant
Policy Analyst for Income Security, National Academy of Social Insurance
Suggested Citation
Edwards, Kathryn Anne, and Griffin Murphy. Economic Security for the 21st Century. Washington DC: The National Academy of Social Insurance, 2022.
Acknowledgements
The Study Panel’s work over a two-year period and this report represent the Academy’s continued focus on income security programs as a key means to provide economic dignity and stability to millions of Americans. Throughout its history, the Academy has often reviewed income security through the lens of social insurance programs— namely Social Security, Unemployment Insurance, and Workers’ Compensation. The interaction of social insurance programs with other programs and laws, however, necessitates continued thought around the entire policy ecosystem and what each program and law is best suited to accomplish. As far back as its fourth annual policy conference in 1992, Security for America’s Children, the Academy sought research and ideas beyond the scope of the traditional social insurance programs. This broader view culminated in the Academy’s 2021 virtual conference, Pathways to Economic Security: Bringing All Voices to the Table. While social insurance programs remain the core focus of the Academy’s work, this report reviews the broad landscape of federal income security policy. This work is also a continuation of the Academy’s 2019 concept paper Assured Income.
The Academy gratefully acknowledges the work of the individuals who served on the Study Panel—especially its co-chairs Jason Fichtner and Renée Landers, and its working group leaders Harry Conaway (Late Life), Christina FitzPatrick (Finance), Elaine Maag (Middle Life), and Kathleen Romig (Early Life). Although the working group divisions were not ultimately utilized in the framing of the report, they were instrumental in outlining the policy options early in the process. The Academy also thanks Bernstein interns Humphrey Shen, who assisted with research on health and finance policy, and Elijah Michel, who assisted with research on income security policy and helped refine the key messages of the report. Last, the Academy is thankful for the stakeholder representatives (listed below) who offered their time to help us better understand the needs of their community members. Their titles represent their positions at the time of our conversation.
Joshua Arce President/CEO, Partnership with Native Americans
Florence Becot Associate Research Scientist, National Farm Medicine Center
Nancy Kay Blackwell Executive Director, Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute
Cindy Borden Director of Training and Technical Assistance, National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
Anastasia Christman Director of Worker Power Program, National Employment Law Project
Shoshanah Inwood Assistant Professor, School of Environment and Natural Resources, Ohio State University
Elizabeth Lower-Basch Co-Leader, Protecting Immigrant Families Campaign, Center for Law and Social Policy
Amy Matsui Director of Income Security, National Women’s Law Center
John McCarthy Project Manager, Michigan Food and Farm Systems
Kathryn Monet Chief Executive Officer, National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
Ty Cobb Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives & Research, Human Rights Campaign
Charleigh Flohr Research Manager, Public Education and Research Program, Human Rights Campaign
Jessica Fulton Vice President, Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies
Bruce Goldstein President, Farmworker Justice
Fatima Goss-Graves President and CEO, National Women’s Law Center
Lillian Harris Founder and President, Advocates for Adolescent Mothers
Derek Montroy External Affairs Project Coordinator, Oneida Indian Nation
Shelly Nortz Deputy Executive Director for Policy, Coalition for the Homeless
Diane Pagen Social Worker and Social Policy Analyst, Co-Founder of Basic Income March
Tammy Seltzer Director of Jail & Prison Advocacy Project, Disability Rights DC
Shayna Strom Chief Deputy National Political Director, American Civil Liberties Union
The Academy’s reports aim to assess policy options without advocating for any particular option. The options and perspectives discussed in this report do not necessarily reflect the views of individual members of the Study Panel or of the organizations with which they are affiliated.
William Arnone
Chief Executive Officer
Study Panel Members
Jason J. Fichtner, Co-Chair, Vice President and Chief Economist, Bipartisan Policy Center
Renée M. Landers, Co-Chair, Professor of Law and Director of the Health Law Concentration, Suffolk University
Harry Conaway, Late Life Working Group Leader, Executive Director, Policy Futures Network
Christina FitzPatrick, Finance Working Group Leader, Director for Economic Issues, AARP Office of Policy Development and Integration
Elaine Maag, Middle Life Working Group Leader, Senior Fellow, Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center
Kathleen Romig, Early Life Working Group Leader, Senior Policy Analyst, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Nancy J. Altman, President, Social Security Works; Chair, Strengthen Social Security coalition
Peter Barnes, Entrepreneur and Author, With Liberty and Dividends for All and Ours: The Case for Universal Property
Lily Batchelder, Robert C. Kopple Family Professor of Law, New York University
Heather Boushey, President, CEO, and co-founder of the Washington Center for Equitable Growth
Peter B. Edelman, Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Law and Public Policy; Faculty Director, Center on Poverty and Inequality
Howard Fluhr, Chairman Emeritus, The Segal Group
Marty Ford, Senior Advisor, Public Policy, The Arc of the United States
Alix Gould-Werth, Director, Family Economic Security Policy, Washington Center for Equitable Growth
Robert Greenstein, Founder and President Emeritus, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; Visiting Fellow in Economic Studies, Brookings Institution
Samuel Hammond, Director of Poverty and Welfare Policy, Niskanen Center
Bradley L. Hardy, Associate Professor, McCourt School of Public Policy, Georgetown University
G. William Hoagland, Senior Vice President, Bipartisan Policy Center
Kilolo Kijakazi, Institute Fellow and Director of the Integrated Financial Coaching Project, Urban Institute
Joseph J. Minarik, Senior Vice President and Director of Research, Committee for Economic Development
David Nexon, President and Founder, Nexon Policy Insights
David R. Riemer, Author, “Putting Government in its Place”
William Rodgers III, Professor of Public Policy and Chief Economist at the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development, Rutgers University
James Roosevelt, Jr., Health Care Attorney, Verrill Dana; Clinical Instructor, Tufts University School of Medicine
Suzanne Simonetta, Director of the Division of Performance Management, Office of Unemployment Insurance
Timothy M. Smeeding, Lee Rainwater Distinguished Professor of Public Affairs and Economics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
William E. Spriggs, Professor of Economics, Howard University; Chief Economist, AFL-CIO
Andrew L. Stern, Senior Fellow, Economic Security Project
Rebecca Vallas, Senior Fellow, The Century Foundation
Stephen A. Wandner, Research Fellow, Upjohn Institute; Senior Fellow, National Academy of Social Insurance; and Visiting Fellow, Urban Institute
Methodology
The contents of this report are the product of a series of meetings by the Economic Security Study Panel, which had one question at its core: How can we go about assuring income via federal policy and in doing so improve economic security in the U.S.?
Panel members come from a broad range of disciplines and experiences. The members include economists, policy analysts, lawyers, and business professionals, in addition to a number of individuals with experience in the federal government, labor unions, actuarial science, social work, the community of people with disabilities, and other sectors. Over the course of 2019 and 2020, the Panel met three times. Additional discussions occurred through smaller Working Groups.
The Study Panel also sought extensive guidance from people who work for practitioner groups that assist communities most affected by income policy and from individuals who advocate on behalf of and communicate with those communities. A list of these individuals and their affiliations at the time of their comments can be found in the Acknowledgements section. The primary goals of these conversations were to better understand the economic security needs of these groups and to identify any gaps in our analysis of income security policy. These discussions took place both in group settings and one-on-one meetings with the Study Panel research team.
1441 L Street NW, Suite 530 • Washington, DC 20005
(202) 452-8097 | Email Us | Visit Nasi.org
About the National Academy of Social Insurance
The National Academy of Social Insurance is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization made up of the nation’s leading experts on social insurance. Its mission is to advance solutions to challenges facing the nation by increasing public understanding of how social insurance contributes to economic security.
Social insurance encompasses broad-based systems that help workers and their families pool risks to avoid loss of income due to retirement, death, disability, or unemployment, and to ensure access to health care.
The Academy convenes steering committees and study panels that are charged with conducting research, issuing findings, and identifying policy option recommendations based on their analyses. Members of these groups are selected for their recognized expertise and with due consideration for the balance of disciplines and perspectives appropriate to each project.
Board of Directors
Renée M. Landers, Chair
Indivar Dutta-Gupta, Vice Chair
Jason J. Fichtner, Treasurer
Rebecca D. Vallas, Secretary
William J. Arnone, Ex-Officio
Harry J. Conaway
Cecilia A. Conrad
Robert Espinoza
Howard Fluhr
Merrill Alisa Friedman
Alexander W. Hertel-Fernandez
Douglas J. Holtz-Eakin
Josephine Kalipeni
Aparna Mathur
Shaun C. O’Brien
Alaine Perry
Earl R. Pomeroy
William M. Rodgers III
Paul Van de Water
Debra Whitman
Project Staff
William Arnone, Project Director
Chief Executive Officer, National Academy of Social Insurance
Kathryn Edwards, Principal Investigator
Economist, RAND Corporation, and Professor, RAND Pardee Graduate School
Griffin Murphy, Research Assistant
Policy Analyst for Income Security, National Academy of Social Insurance
Suggested Citation
Edwards, Kathryn Anne, and Griffin Murphy. Economic Security for the 21st Century. Washington DC: The National Academy of Social Insurance, 2022.
Acknowledgements
The Study Panel’s work over a two-year period and this report represent the Academy’s continued focus on income security programs as a key means to provide economic dignity and stability to millions of Americans. Throughout its history, the Academy has often reviewed income security through the lens of social insurance programs— namely Social Security, Unemployment Insurance, and Workers’ Compensation. The interaction of social insurance programs with other programs and laws, however, necessitates continued thought around the entire policy ecosystem and what each program and law is best suited to accomplish. As far back as its fourth annual policy conference in 1992, Security for America’s Children, the Academy sought research and ideas beyond the scope of the traditional social insurance programs. This broader view culminated in the Academy’s 2021 virtual conference, Pathways to Economic Security: Bringing All Voices to the Table. While social insurance programs remain the core focus of the Academy’s work, this report reviews the broad landscape of federal income security policy. This work is also a continuation of the Academy’s 2019 concept paper Assured Income.
The Academy gratefully acknowledges the work of the individuals who served on the Study Panel—especially its co-chairs Jason Fichtner and Renée Landers, and its working group leaders Harry Conaway (Late Life), Christina FitzPatrick (Finance), Elaine Maag (Middle Life), and Kathleen Romig (Early Life). Although the working group divisions were not ultimately utilized in the framing of the report, they were instrumental in outlining the policy options early in the process. The Academy also thanks Bernstein interns Humphrey Shen, who assisted with research on health and finance policy, and Elijah Michel, who assisted with research on income security policy and helped refine the key messages of the report. Last, the Academy is thankful for the stakeholder representatives (listed below) who offered their time to help us better understand the needs of their community members. Their titles represent their positions at the time of our conversation.
Joshua Arce President/CEO, Partnership with Native Americans
Florence Becot Associate Research Scientist, National Farm Medicine Center
Nancy Kay Blackwell Executive Director, Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute
Cindy Borden Director of Training and Technical Assistance, National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
Anastasia Christman Director of Worker Power Program, National Employment Law Project
Shoshanah Inwood Assistant Professor, School of Environment and Natural Resources, Ohio State University
Elizabeth Lower-Basch Co-Leader, Protecting Immigrant Families Campaign, Center for Law and Social Policy
Amy Matsui Director of Income Security, National Women’s Law Center
John McCarthy Project Manager, Michigan Food and Farm Systems
Kathryn Monet Chief Executive Officer, National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
Ty Cobb Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives & Research, Human Rights Campaign
Charleigh Flohr Research Manager, Public Education and Research Program, Human Rights Campaign
Jessica Fulton Vice President, Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies
Bruce Goldstein President, Farmworker Justice
Fatima Goss-Graves President and CEO, National Women’s Law Center
Lillian Harris Founder and President, Advocates for Adolescent Mothers
Derek Montroy External Affairs Project Coordinator, Oneida Indian Nation
Shelly Nortz Deputy Executive Director for Policy, Coalition for the Homeless
Diane Pagen Social Worker and Social Policy Analyst, Co-Founder of Basic Income March
Tammy Seltzer Director of Jail & Prison Advocacy Project, Disability Rights DC
Shayna Strom Chief Deputy National Political Director, American Civil Liberties Union
The Academy’s reports aim to assess policy options without advocating for any particular option. The options and perspectives discussed in this report do not necessarily reflect the views of individual members of the Study Panel or of the organizations with which they are affiliated.
William Arnone
Chief Executive Officer
Study Panel Members
Jason J. Fichtner, Co-Chair, Vice President and Chief Economist, Bipartisan Policy Center
Renée M. Landers, Co-Chair, Professor of Law and Director of the Health Law Concentration, Suffolk University
Harry Conaway, Late Life Working Group Leader, Executive Director, Policy Futures Network
Christina FitzPatrick, Finance Working Group Leader, Director for Economic Issues, AARP Office of Policy Development and Integration
Elaine Maag, Middle Life Working Group Leader, Senior Fellow, Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center
Kathleen Romig, Early Life Working Group Leader, Senior Policy Analyst, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Nancy J. Altman, President, Social Security Works; Chair, Strengthen Social Security coalition
Peter Barnes, Entrepreneur and Author, With Liberty and Dividends for All and Ours: The Case for Universal Property
Lily Batchelder, Robert C. Kopple Family Professor of Law, New York University
Heather Boushey, President, CEO, and co-founder of the Washington Center for Equitable Growth
Peter B. Edelman, Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Law and Public Policy; Faculty Director, Center on Poverty and Inequality
Howard Fluhr, Chairman Emeritus, The Segal Group
Marty Ford, Senior Advisor, Public Policy, The Arc of the United States
Alix Gould-Werth, Director, Family Economic Security Policy, Washington Center for Equitable Growth
Robert Greenstein, Founder and President Emeritus, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; Visiting Fellow in Economic Studies, Brookings Institution
Samuel Hammond, Director of Poverty and Welfare Policy, Niskanen Center
Bradley L. Hardy, Associate Professor, McCourt School of Public Policy, Georgetown University
G. William Hoagland, Senior Vice President, Bipartisan Policy Center
Kilolo Kijakazi, Institute Fellow and Director of the Integrated Financial Coaching Project, Urban Institute
Joseph J. Minarik, Senior Vice President and Director of Research, Committee for Economic Development
David Nexon, President and Founder, Nexon Policy Insights
David R. Riemer, Author, “Putting Government in its Place”
William Rodgers III, Professor of Public Policy and Chief Economist at the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development, Rutgers University
James Roosevelt, Jr., Health Care Attorney, Verrill Dana; Clinical Instructor, Tufts University School of Medicine
Suzanne Simonetta, Director of the Division of Performance Management, Office of Unemployment Insurance
Timothy M. Smeeding, Lee Rainwater Distinguished Professor of Public Affairs and Economics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
William E. Spriggs, Professor of Economics, Howard University; Chief Economist, AFL-CIO
Andrew L. Stern, Senior Fellow, Economic Security Project
Rebecca Vallas, Senior Fellow, The Century Foundation
Stephen A. Wandner, Research Fellow, Upjohn Institute; Senior Fellow, National Academy of Social Insurance; and Visiting Fellow, Urban Institute
Methodology
The contents of this report are the product of a series of meetings by the Economic Security Study Panel, which had one question at its core: How can we go about assuring income via federal policy and in doing so improve economic security in the U.S.?
Panel members come from a broad range of disciplines and experiences. The members include economists, policy analysts, lawyers, and business professionals, in addition to a number of individuals with experience in the federal government, labor unions, actuarial science, social work, the community of people with disabilities, and other sectors. Over the course of 2019 and 2020, the Panel met three times. Additional discussions occurred through smaller Working Groups.
The Study Panel also sought extensive guidance from people who work for practitioner groups that assist communities most affected by income policy and from individuals who advocate on behalf of and communicate with those communities. A list of these individuals and their affiliations at the time of their comments can be found in the Acknowledgements section. The primary goals of these conversations were to better understand the economic security needs of these groups and to identify any gaps in our analysis of income security policy. These discussions took place both in group settings and one-on-one meetings with the Study Panel research team.
1441 L Street NW, Suite 530 • Washington, DC 20005
(202) 452-8097 | Email Us | Visit Nasi.org