Perry Singleton

Overview

Perry Singleton is a labor and health economist at the Department of Economics, Syracuse University. His research focuses on how disability insurance programs, health shocks, and health information interact with labor supply, household stability, and Social Security claiming decisions.

Key Contributions

• Singleton (2009a): "Insult to Injury: Disability, Earnings, and Divorce." CRR Working Paper WP 2009-25. Uses retrospective SIPP data merged to SSA Detailed Earnings Records to show that work-limiting disability onset raises the divorce hazard by 13.3 pp for young, educated men with work-preventing disabilities, reconciling the Charles-Stephens (2004) aggregate null result via age-heterogeneity of both disability incidence and the divorce effect.
• Singleton (2009b): "The Effect of Disability Insurance on Health Investment: Evidence from the Veterans Benefits Administration's Disability Compensation Program." Journal of Human Resources 44(4): 998–1022. Shows that an expansion of disability benefits for Vietnam veterans with diabetes increased the prevalence and treatment of diabetes — evidence that program generosity shapes health investment decisions and may endogenously affect the health conditions that trigger eligibility.
• Duggan, Rosenheck, and Singleton (2009): "Federal Policy and the Rise in Disability Enrollment: Evidence for the VA's Disability Compensation Program." Working paper, January 2009. First rigorous economic study of the VA Disability Compensation (DC) program; uses the 2001 Agent Orange / diabetes decision as a natural experiment (difference-in-differences, Vietnam theater vs. other veterans); estimates ~6 pp enrollment increase among Vietnam veterans, $2.85B annual /$50B present-value expenditure increase; no effect on veteran labor supply; significant spousal labor supply reduction.
• Duggan, Singleton, and Song (2007): "Aching to Retire? The Rise in the Full Retirement Age and Its Impact on the Disability Rolls." Journal of Public Economics 91(7–8): 1327–1350 (NBER WP 11811, 2005). Co-authored cohort analysis using SSA CWHS data for men born 1935–1945. The 1983 FRA increase cuts early OA at 62 from 80% to 70% of PIA while leaving DI unchanged, raising the DI financial advantage. Year-of-birth identification yields ~42,000 additional male DI recipients long-run (1.3% of male rolls), concentrated at ages 63–64 and low-AIME workers. DI increase offsets only 3.9% of OASDI savings from the FRA rise. Placebo test on pre-policy cohorts passes cleanly. See DI Growth Decomposition.
• Singleton (2024): "Health Information and the Timing of Social Security Benefit Entitlements." Working paper. Exploits random NHANES exam-time assignment to show that new health diagnoses (particularly diabetes) delay SS claiming by 0.380 years for workers aged 59–61, operating through employment lock — workers extend employment to retain employer-provided health insurance before Medicare access at 65.

Related

• Employment Lock
• Disability and Marital Dissolution
• Match Quality and Marital Dissolution
• Disability Insurance Program
• Social Security Administration
• Health and Retirement Study
• Mark Duggan
• Robert Rosenheck
• Jae Song
• DI Growth Decomposition

Sources

• Singleton 2009 — Insult to Injury Disability, Earnings, and Divorce
• Singleton 2024 — Health Information and the Timing of Social Security Benefit Entitlements
• Duggan, Rosenheck, and Singleton 2010 — Federal Policy and the Rise in Disability Enrollment Evidence for the VA's Disability Compensation Program
• Duggan, Singleton, and Song 2007 — Aching to Retire The Rise in the Full Retirement Age and Its Impact on the Disability Rolls
• Meyer and Mok 2014 — Disabled Women and Their Economic Well-Being