Does Retirement Kill You? Evidence from Early Retirement Windows

The magnitude of the effect that health has on the retirement decision has long been studied. We examine the reverse relationship, whether or not retirement has a direct impact on later-life health. In order to identify the causal relationship, we use unexpected early retirement window offers to instrument for retirement behavior. They are legally required to be unrelated to the baseline health of the individual, and are significant predictors of retirement. We find that there is no negative effect of early retirement on men's health, and if anything, a temporary increase in self-reported health and improvements in health of highly educated workers. While this is consistent with previous literature using Social Security ages as instruments, we also find some evidence that anticipation of retirement might also be important, and might bias the previous estimates towards zero.health, retirement, instrument, causal effect

How Can Customized Information Change Financial Plans?

Many workers nearing retirement experienced a dramatic decrease in their retirement assets when the stock market crashed in 2008. In order to maintain their expected standard of living in retirement, workers needed to work longer, save more, or do both. To measure the response of older workers to this downturn, the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College (CRR) fielded the CRR 2009 Retirement Survey on a nationally representative sample of 45-59-year-old labor force participants with relatively high pre-downturn assets. This brief is the final in a series of four based on the CRR 2009 Retirement Survey. The first brief described the Survey and highlighted the inclusion of numerous financial, employment, and behavioral factors that are omitted from other surveys. The second brief explored the relationship between these factors and worker responses to the downturn. The third brief examined how worker responses were affected when their options were made explicit – work longer, save more, or live on less in retirement. This brief explores how respondents reacted once they received information tailored to their specific situation. This brief is organized as follows. The first section provides an overview of the workers’ initial responses – work more, save more, both, or neither. The second section describes how these stated responses changed after respondents received “expert advice” that quantified the trade-off based on their specific circumstances. The third section looks at the characteristics of responders who remained committed to taking no action even after the expert advice. The fourth section assesses whether the expert advice led certain respondents to better calibrate their plans. The final section concludes that providing tailored financial advice may help some individuals improve their response to an adverse financial development.

Performance of 75 millimeter-bore arched outer-race ball bearings

An investigation was performed to determine the operating characteristics of 75-mm bore, arched outer-race bearings, and to compare the data with those for a similar, but conventional, deep groove ball bearing. Further, results of an analytical study, made using a computer program developed previously, were compared with the experimental data. Bearings were tested up to 28,000 rpm shaft speed with a load of 2200 N (500 lb). The amount of arching was 0.13, 0.25, and 0.51 mm (.005, .010, and .020 in.). All bearings operated satisfactorily. The outer-race temperatures and the torques, however, were consistently higher for the arched bearings than for the conventional bearing

Population Dynamics in the Penna Model

We build upon the recent steady-state Penna model solution, Phys.Rev.Lett. 89, 288103 (2002), to study the population dynamics within the Penna model. We show, that any perturbation to the population can be broken into a collection of modes each of which decay exponentially with its respective time constant. The long time behaviour of population is therefore likely to be dominated by the modes with the largest time constants. We confirm our analytical approach with simulation data.Comment: 6 figure

Crossflow effects on steady and fluctuating pressures on an ogive-cylinder cone-frustum model in supersonic separated flow

Wind-tunnel tests were conducted on an ogive-cylinder model with two axisymmetric protuberances having cone frustum angles of cone = 23 deg and 45 deg that were used to generate detached shock waves and the resulting separated flow areas downstream of the shock. The tests were conducted in a 9 by 7 foot supersonic wind tunnel at a free-stream Mach number of 2.0 and at Reynolds numbers of 1.5 x 1 million and 3.9 x 1 million, based on body diameter. The model had an afterbody fineness ratio of 8.3, and the ogive nose had a fineness ratio of 3.0. Two characteristics of the fluctuating pressures in surface vortex flows that result from the crossflow component, (velocity along the tunnel longitudinal axis free stream angle of attack), in combination with changes in the longitudinal pressure gradient were measured: (1) the broadband, rms-pressure coefficients and (2) the power spectral densities. Measurements are presented for various flow regions on the model such as the attached turbulent boundary layer, the detached frustum shock wave, and separated flow areas. The results indicate that the pressure fluctuations around or in the neighborhood of the foci of the vortex flows had broadband intensities and power spectral densities nearly identical to the levels previously measured in separated-flow regions at angles of attack of 0 deg

Results of recent NASA research on low-speed aerodynamic characteristics of supersonic cruise aircraft

The relatively low values of lift-curve slope produced by highly swept arrow wings, coupled with the low scrape angle of the fuselage, resulted in relatively low values of take-off and approach lift coefficients. Through the use of more efficient high-lift systems and the application of propulsive-lift concepts, it is possible to optimize the engine-airframe design for maximum range potential and also to provide good low-speed performance. Nose strakes provide significant improvements in directional stability characteristics and the use of a propulsive lateral control system provides a solution to problems associated with inherently low levels of lateral control

A major outburst from the X-ray binary RX J0520.5-6932

We report on the analysis of 8 years of MAssive Compact Halo Objects (MACHO) data for the source RX J0520.5-6932. A regular period of 24.4 days has been confirmed, however this is manifest almost entirely in the red part of the spectrum. A major outburst, lasting approximately 200 days, was observed which increased the apparent brightness of the object by approximately 0.15 magnitudes without significantly altering its V-R colour index. This outburst was also seen in X-ray data. The evidence from this analysis points to the identification of this object as a Be/X-ray binary with a periodically variable circumstellar disk and a very early optical counterpart.Comment: Paper has been accepted by MNRA

Medicaid Crowd-Out of Private Long-Term Care Insurance Demand: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Survey

This paper provides empirical evidence of Medicaid crowd out of demand for private long-term care insurance. Using data on the near- and young-elderly in the Health and Retirement Survey, our central estimate suggests that a $10,000 decrease in the level of assets an individual can keep while qualifying for Medicaid would increase private long-term care insurance coverage by 1.1 percentage points. These estimates imply that if every state in the country moved from their current Medicaid asset eligibility requirements to the most stringent Medicaid eligibility requirements allowed by federal law – a change that would decrease average household assets protected by Medicaid by about$25,000 – demand for private long-term care insurance would rise by 2.7 percentage points. While this represents a 30 percent increase in insurance coverage relative to the baseline ownership rate of 9.1 percent, it also indicates that the vast majority of households would still find it unattractive to purchase private insurance. We discuss reasons why, even with extremely stringent eligibility requirements, Medicaid may still exert a large crowd-out effect on demand for private insurance.