New Beneficiary Data System (NBDS)
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Contact Information
For additional information, contact Dr. Howard Iams at (202) 358-6217 or e-mail howard.m.iams@ssa.gov.
Background
The New Beneficiary Data System (NBDS), developed over the past decade, contains extensive information on the changing circumstances of aged and disabled beneficiaries.
Based initially on a national cross-sectional survey of new beneficiaries in 1982, the original data base has been expanded with information from administrative records and a second round of interviews in 1991. Variables measured in the original New Beneficiary Survey (NBS) include demographic characteristics; employment, marital, and childbearing histories; household composition; health; income and assets; program knowledge; and information about the spouses of married respondents.
The 1991 New Beneficiary Follow-up (NBF) updates marital status, household composition, and the economic profile and contains additional sections on family contacts, postretirement employment, effects of widowhood and divorce, major reasons for changes in economic status, a more extensive section on health, and information on household moves and reasons for moving. Disabled-worker beneficiaries were also asked about their efforts to return to work, experiences with rehabilitation services, and knowledge of SSA work incentive provisions.
The NBDS contains unique measurements that make it valuable not only for studies about Social Security but also for studies of health, economic, labor, gerontological, and welfare issues. It contains objective measures from administrative files of yearly covered earnings from 1951 to 2000, Medicare expenditures from 1984 to 1992, whether an SSI application has ever been made and payment status at 5 points in time, and dates of death as of spring 2001. For studies of health, the Medicare expenditure variables include inpatient hospital costs, outpatient hospital costs, home health care costs, and physicians' charges. The survey data cover functional capacity including ADLs and IADLs. For studies of work in retirement, the survey includes yearly information on extent of work, characteristics of the current or last job, and reasons for working or not working. No other data set has such detailed baseline survey data of a population immediately after their retirement or disability enhanced with subsequent measures over an extended period of time.
Available Information
1982 New Beneficiary Survey
Documentation. The following NBS documentation files are available in WordPerfect 5.1/5.2 format as PKZIP 2.04g self-extracting files:
- The NBS User's Manual, usrmanul.exe (94.7 KB)
- The NBS Main Questionnaire (in PDF), nbsall.exe (1.77 MB)
- The NBS Codebook, nbscdbk.exe (162 KB)
- All of the NBS documentation in one PKZIP executable file, nbsdoc.exe (200 MB)
Note: We have altered the Internet version of the 1982 NBS to meet privacy concerns, and the data differ slightly from the codebook description. Dollar values for income, assets, and earnings have been rounded to 4 digits (left justified), and zeros have been added to maintain the same general value. Geography (Region and SMSA) has been blanked. Alimony income has been merged with other income from relatives outside the household, and the original alimony fields have been blanked. We hope that this causes minimal inconvenience. If there are questions, please contact Howard Iams
Data Files. The NBS Public Use data has been divided into four groups: retired beneficiaries, disabled beneficiaries, other aged beneficiaries, and Medicare Only beneficiaries.
- Retired Respondents, retnbs.exe (4.82 MB)
- Disabled Respondents, disnbs.exe (2.55 MB)
- Other Aged Respondents, othnbs.exe (1.16 MB)
- Medicare Only Respondents, mednbs.exe (707 KB)
1991 New Beneficiary Follow-up Survey
Documentation. The following NBF documentation files are available in Wordperfect 5.1/5.2 format as PKZIP 2.04 self-extracting files:
- NBF User's Guide, ursmanul.exe (105 KB)
- The NBF Main Questionnaire, nbfall.exe (94.9 KB)
- The NBF Question-by-question interviewer instructions, scrall.exe (117 KB)
- The NBF codebook, nbfcdbk.exe (157 KB)
- All of the NBF documentation in one executable PKZIP file, nbfdoc.exe (430 KB)
Note: We have detected an error in the summary income from assets (Variable FQASSET). The income from private insurance and annuities, questionnaire items 346g, 347g, 348g, 359g, 360g, and 361g (totaled in Variable FQINSUR) was omitted from the summary income from assets (FQASSET), and from the total of income (FQINCOM). When processing income data, please add the FQINSUR variable to the FQASSET and FQINCOME data. Because this affects very few cases, we hope this causes minimal inconvenience. If there are questions concerning this problem, please contact Howard Iams (202-358-6217).
Data. The NBF Public Use data has been divided into four groups: retired beneficiaries, disabled beneficiaries, other aged beneficiaries, and Medicare Only beneficiaries. Each group is further subdivided into data files for respondents and surviving spouses.
- Retired respondents, retresp.exe (2.07 MB)
- Survivors of Retired respondents, retsurv.exe (280 KB)
- Disabled respondents, dibresp.exe (1.08 MB)
- Survivors of Disabled respondents, dibsurv.exe (226 KB)
- Other Aged Respondents, othresp.exe (563 KB)
- Survivors of Other Aged Group, othsurv.exe (37.7 KB)
- Medicare Only Respondents, medresp.exe (381 KB)
- Survivors of Medicare Only respondents, medsurv.exe (66 KB)
- NBF longitudinal imputation data in PKZIP.EXE (1.44 MB) format containing:
- NBF longitudinal Imputation File as an ASCII file
- Documentation as a WordPerfect (Windows 5.2) file
- Some statistics for all variables as an ASCII file
- Note: the Uncompressed version of all files is approximately 20 MB.
Administrative Data for the New Beneficiary Data System Respondents and Spouses
Documentation. Documentation for the administrative data is available in Wordperfect 5.1/5.2 format and for an update in Word 97 format. Both are available as PKZIP 2.04 self-extracting files.
Data. The NBDS Public Use Administrative Data has been divided into four groups: Retired beneficiaries, Disabled beneficiaries, Other aged beneficiaries, and Medicare Only beneficiaries. (An update file records benefits in December 2000 and earnings in 1991-1999.) Each group is available as a PKZIP 2.04 self-extracting file in ASCII format.
- Administrative data for the Retired Group, retadmn.exe (2.92 MB)
- Administrative data for the Disabled Group, dibadmn.exe (1.54 MB)
- Administrative data for the Other Aged Group, othadmn.exe (715 KB)
- Administrative data for the Medicare Only Group, medadmn.exe (443 KB)
- Update data for everyone, update.exe
Accessibility and Usability Information
This document predates the implementation of Section 508 and is not accessible to persons with disabilities. If you need access to information in this document, please contact the person(s) listed above.
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