Effects of Public Policies on the Disposition of Pre-retirement Lump-Sum Distributions: Rational and Behavioral Influences

A variety of public policies aim to influence workers’ disposition of preretirement lump-sum distributions (LSDs) from pensions. We use the implementation of several policy changes as natural experiments to test for rational and behavioral motives for saving behavior. Using data from the HRS and the CPS in the 1980s and 1990s, we find that higher tax rates on cash-outs increase rollovers. Controlling for the overall effective tax rate, structuring the tax as a “penalty” or adding withholding taxes on cashouts significantly increases rollovers. Allowing employers to unilaterally cash out balances for departing employees who do not make their own choice significantly reduces the effects of higher tax rates but boosts the impact of withholding taxes. These results suggest that both behavioral and rational factors influence workers’ choices, that policies relating to pre-retirement cash outs can interact in important ways, and that the government has several levers at its disposal to influence behavior beyond tax penalties.retirement;savings;behavioral;penalties;taxes

The AMT: What’s Wrong and How to Fix It

The alternative minimum tax (AMT) is a complex, unfair, and inefficient shadow tax system that threatens to affect 32 million taxpayers by 2010, many of them solidly middle class. Under current law, repealing the AMT without offsets would cost more than $850 billion through 2017. This paper summarizes the current and projected effects of the AMT and considers options to finance repeal. One attractive option we consider would be to combine AMT repeal with a four percent tax on AGI in excess of$200,000 for married couples and $100,000 for others

The AMT: What’s Wrong and How to Fix It

The alternative minimum tax (AMT) is a complex, unfair, and inefficient shadow tax system that threatens to affect 32 million taxpayers by 2010, many of them solidly middle class. Under current law, repealing the AMT without offsets would cost more than $850 billion through 2017. This paper summarizes the current and projected effects of the AMT and considers options to finance repeal. One attractive option we consider would be to combine AMT repeal with a four percent tax on AGI in excess of$200,000 for married couples and $100,000 for others

A critical analysis of Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services policy in England

Policy in Child and Adolescent Mental Health (CAMH) in England has undergone radical changes in the last 15 years, with far reaching implications for funding models, access to services and service delivery. Using corpus analysis and critical discourse analysis, we explore how childhood, mental health, and CAMHS are constituted in 15 policy documents, 9 pre-2010, and 6 post 2010. We trace how these constructions have changed over time, and consider the practice implications of these changes. We identify how children’s distress is individualised, through medicalising discourses and shifting understandings of the relationship between socioeconomic context and mental health. This is evidenced in a shift from seeing children’s mental health challenges as produced by social and economic inequities, to a view that children’s mental health must be addressed early to prevent future socio-economic burden. We consider the implications CAMHS policies for the relationship between children, families, mental health services and the state. The paper concludes by exploring how concepts of ‘parity of esteem’ and ‘stigma reduction’ may inadvertently exacerbate the individualisation of children’s mental health

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

The Tax Reform Proposals: Some Good Ideas, but Show Me the Money

The President's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform has submitted an important set of proposed structural changes that would generally move the tax system in the right direction. However, at the tax rates the Panel proposes, the plans will not bring in the revenue the U.S. needs.

Effects of Public Policies on the Disposition of Pre-retirement Lump-Sum Distributions: Rational and Behavioral Influences

A variety of public policies aim to influence workers’ disposition of preretirement lump-sum distributions (LSDs) from pensions. We use the implementation of several policy changes as natural experiments to test for rational and behavioral motives for saving behavior. Using data from the HRS and the CPS in the 1980s and 1990s, we find that higher tax rates on cash-outs increase rollovers. Controlling for the overall effective tax rate, structuring the tax as a “penalty” or adding withholding taxes on cashouts significantly increases rollovers. Allowing employers to unilaterally cash out balances for departing employees who do not make their own choice significantly reduces the effects of higher tax rates but boosts the impact of withholding taxes. These results suggest that both behavioral and rational factors influence workers’ choices, that policies relating to pre-retirement cash outs can interact in important ways, and that the government has several levers at its disposal to influence behavior beyond tax penalties