Advisory: Olivia Mitchell to keynote May 30-31 D.C. conference

“Directions for Social Security Reform,” the fourth annual conference of the Retirement Research Consortium, will be held on Thursday and Friday (May30- 31) at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. News media are invited to attend.

Co-sponsored by the University of Michigan Retirement Research Center, based at the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR), and the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, the conference includes presentations by the nation’s leading retirement research experts on topics relevant to Social Security reform.

Among the topics highlighted will be the prevalence and impact of early retirement offers on work force participation by older Americans, perspectives on reform, distributional effects, the private sector, interactions among social insurance programs, and health issues in retirement.

A panel discussion will address Social Security voluntary personal retirement accounts. Keynote speaker Olivia S. Mitchell, a member of the President’s Commission to Strengthen Social Security, will comment on the findings of the commission. James B. Lockhart III, deputy commissioner of the Social Security Administration, will also speak. A complete agenda is available on the Michigan Retirement Research Center’s Web site at: http://www.mrrc.isr.umich.edu/conferences/agenda.pdf  [Acrobat or other .PDF file reader required.]

Reporters interested in attending the conference or receiving additional information should contact Diane Swanbrow at [email protected] or (734) 647-4416.

The Retirement Research Consortium (RRC) consists of two university-based Centers that were established in 1998 through grants from the Social Security Administration: the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College and the University of Michigan Retirement Research Center. The mission of the RRC is to promote research on retirement policy issues that will help policy-makers prepare for an aging population. Each Center consists of a team of experts from affiliated institutions, which consist of Cornell University, MIT, the National Academy of Social Insurance, the National Bureau of Economic Research, the RAND Corporation, Syracuse University, the Brookings Institution, the University of California-Berkeley, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Urban Institute.

The world’s largest academic survey and research organization, the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research (ISR) was established in 1948. A leader in the development and application of social science methodology, ISR conducts some of the most widely-cited studies in the nation. These include the Survey of Consumer Attitudes, National Election Studies, the Monitoring the Future Study, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the Health and Retirement Study, the Columbia County Longitudinal Study, and the NationalSurvey of Black Americans. ISR researchers also collaborate with social scientists in more than 60 nations on the World Values Surveys and other projects, and the Institute has formal ties with universities in Poland, China, andSouth Africa.

Retirement Research ConsortiumRetirement Research CenterOlivia S. Mitchell[email protected]Survey of Consumer AttitudesWorld Values Surveys