The Future of Retirement Security in the United States: Laying the Groundwork for Public Discussion
Retirement-related policies and programs have changed greatly throughout the past century. That's true for both the public and private sectors. As a result, the connections and fit between government policies and private retirement programs have been in a near constant state of transition. The evolution is likely to continue. Current programs haven't even caught up with recent changes in the economy, life spans, population, and conditions affecting workers' health-all areas where further developments are almost certain. Policies and programs will also need to keep up with changing atritudes toward work, aging, and retirement. As legislators, corporate leaders, and employee representatives begin to examine possible changes, the nation could benefit from a public discussion about retirement security and the appropriate goals and direction of public policy in this area. Such a discussion can help decision makers choose the right mix of policies and institutional arrangements. It can also help citizens make sound individual choices. The Interactivity Foundation (IF) began laying the groundwork for a public discussion of retirement security in early 2002.1 A few months earlier, the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security released a report outlining three options for introdUcing personal retirement accounts into the Social Security system.2 Rather than rethink America's retirement policies in the broad context of a changing society, the Commission looked only at the program details of Social Security-and did so under the constraint of six "guiding principles" that restricted the alternatives to be developed. In contrast, IF sought to provide background material to spark the missing, broader discussion.3 To generate this background material, IF established the Retirement Security Project. It was directed and facilitated by this author, who resides near Rochester, New York. A diverse group of project panelists was recruited, selected, and convened from a three-county western New York area containing urban, suburban, and rural communities.4 In accordance with the IF discussion process, a dozen panelists met monthly from November 2002 through January 2004, initially working as two panels-one for retirement-related professionals and one for interested citizens-but eventually combining to form a single project panel.5