Earnings Inequality and Mobility in the United States, 1937-2004: Evidence from Social Security Administration Data

提案编号：0617737机构：国家经济研究局NSF计划：经济学主要研究员：赛斯，伊曼纽尔标题：收入不平等和流动性在美国，1937-2004年：证据来自社会保障管理局数据摘要收入不平等的来源和后果一直是经济学家，工会，政党和政策制定者非常关注。 然而，大多数关于收入不平等的工作要么侧重于横截面数据，要么侧重于非常短的时间序列数据，因此无法提供关于不平等如何影响流动性的长期观点。这项研究将使用社会保障局的大量纵向数据，调查自1937年以来美国收入不平等和流动性的演变。 该研究还将研究自1937年以来收入流动性如何影响美国收入不平等的变化，以及影响流动性和收入不平等的因素。大样本将允许PI测试已广泛用于较小数据集的结构迁移率模型是否得到很好的指定。最后，这些数据将被用来揭示1986年对高收入者大幅减税后，人们观察到的最高工资收入激增背后的机制。这项研究将创建一个新的一系列的收入流动性和不平等的简要措施，在美国1937年至2004年期间，分解的年龄，性别和种族血统。社会保障管理局的收入数据比任何现有的调查数据都要大得多，准确得多，可以用来估计这些系列，而且从未被用来产生这样的系统系列。在社会保障管理局通过必要的保密审查后，创建的一系列汇总措施将向其他研究人员公开。 这种同质数据的可用性不仅使研究人员，而且使决策者、新闻界和更广泛的公众能够讨论和评论收入不平等和跨性别和种族的流动性问题。因此，这项研究将具有重要的政策应用。

Proposal No: 0617737 Institution: NBER NSF Program: ECONOMICS Principal Investigator: Saez, Emmanuel Title: Earnings Inequality and Mobility in the United States, 1937-2004: Evidence from Social Security Administration Data ABSTRACTThe sources and consequences of income inequality has been of great concern for economists, labor unions, political parties, and policy makers alike. Yet most of the work on income inequality has either focused on cross section data or very short time series data, thus not being able to provide a long term view of how inequality affects mobility. This proposed research will investigate the evolution of earnings inequality and mobility in the United States since 1937 using a large longitudinal data from the Social Security Administration. The study will also study how income mobility affects changes in income inequality in the United States since 1937 as well as account for the factors the affect mobility and the inequality of earnings. The large sample will allow the PI to test whether structural mobility models that have been used extensively with smaller datasets are well specified. Finally, the data will be used to cast light on the mechanisms behind the surge in top wage incomes that has been observed after the large tax rate cut on high earnings of 1986. This research will create a new series of summary measures of earnings mobility and inequality in the United States for the period 1937-2004, decomposed by age, gender, and ethnic origin. The Social Security Administration earnings data is much larger and accurate than any existing survey data to estimate such series, and have never been used to produce such systematic series. The series of summary measures created will be made publicly available to other researchers, after the Social Security Administration clears it of the necessary confidentiality review. The availability of such homogeneous data will allow not only researchers but also policy makers, the press, and the broader public to discuss and comment on issues of earnings inequality and mobility over time, across gender and ethnic origin lines. This research will therefore have important policy applications.