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CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES September 9, 1998 HOW WOULD VARIOUS SOCIAL SECURITY REFORM PLANS AFFECT SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS? An Analysis of the Congressional Research Service Report by Kilolo Kijakazi and Robert Greenstein Summary In June of this year, Rep. Charles Rangel, ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee, released a Congressional Research Service analysis he had requested on the extent to which three Social Security reform proposals would reduce defined Social Security benefits. The three plans include: the bill introduced by Senators Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Robert Kerrey (S. 1792); a proposal by the National Commission on Retirement Policy, a panel of Members of Congress and private citizens organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (legislation recently introduced in the Senate by Senators Judd Gregg, John Breaux and a few other senators - S. 2313 - and in the House by Reps. Jim Kolbe, Charles Stenholm, and others - H.R. 4256 - is based on the NCRP proposal); and a May 1998 proposal by Robert Ball, commissioner of the Social Security Administration under Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon and a member of the 1994-1996 Social Security Advisory Council. The CRS analysis was not designed to be a comprehensive analysis of all components of these three plans, but rather an assessment of an important issue - the degree to which the "defined," or guaranteed, benefits that beneficiaries would be assured of receiving through the Social Security system would change under the three plans. Accordingly, the study does not examine the retirement income that could be generated by individual accounts, which the three plans all contain in differing forms. 1 The CRS analysis finds that the Social Security benefits guaranteed under the three plans vary greatly. 1 The analysis also does not examine changes in payroll taxes or the effects of a few features of the plans, such as proposals in some plans to eliminate the Social Security earnings test. F:\research\kilolo\CRSANAL1.WPD 820 First Street, NE, Suite 510, Washington, DC 20002 Tel: 202-408-1080 Fax: 202-408-1056 [email protected] http://www.cbpp.org HN0026