Overview
Researcher at the Office of Policy Evaluation and Modeling, within SSA's Office of Research, Evaluation, and Statistics (ORES), Office of Retirement and Disability Policy, Social Security Administration. Works on disability program analysis, administrative data methodology, and structural modeling of the disability determination process.
Key Contributions / Features
- Co-authored with Alexander Strand the canonical documentation of how SSA's sequential determination steps map to the Regulation Basis Code in administrative data (Wixon and Strand 2013).
- Early retirement as disability backstop (Leonesio and Wixon 2004): Documented that ~12% of OASI early retirees aged 62–64 simulate meeting SSA disability criteria but cannot access DI (no insured status) or SSI (assets > $2,000 means test). Simulation showed eliminating early retirement benefits would leave 17% of health-impaired early retirees with no safety net. See Early Retirement Safety Net Gap.
- Co-authored the foundational structural model of the DI determination process using matched SIPP/administrative data (Lahiri, Vaughan, and Wixon 1995; Hu and others 2001).
- Contributed to survey-based estimation of medical eligibility: "Counting the Disabled: Using Survey Self-Reports to Estimate Medical Eligibility for Social Security's Disability Programs" (Dwyer and others 2002/2003).
- Co-authored a structural model of DI using matched SIPP/administrative data incorporating econometric methods (Lahiri, Song, and Wixon 2008).
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