Sergi Jimenez-Martin and Alfonso R. Sanchez Martin, "Evaluation of the Lifecycle Effects of Minimum Pensions on Retirement Behavior in Spain", Journal of Applied Econometrics, Vol. 22, No. 5, 2007, pp. 923-950. Our main microeconomic data set is based on confidential administrative records from the Spanish Social Security Administration (HLSS: Historiales Laborales de la Seguridad Social). The original sample consists of 250,000 individual work histories randomly drawn from the historical files of SS affiliates (Fichero Histórico de Afiliados). It includes individuals aged 40+ on July 31, 1998, the date at which the files were prepared. The sample contains individuals from the General Regime and all the Special Regimes but excludes Central Government employees. We refer to Boldrin et al. (2004) for a more detailed description of the variables in the HLSS files. [A document describing the variables in the data set is available from the authors on request.] In 2006, a new release of the source was made available for researchers. The original sample consists of more than one million individual work histories randomly drawn from the historical files of SS affiliates (see Argimon and Gonzalez (2006) for a description). Requests to use the data and questions should be addressed to the Dirección General de Ordenación de la Seguridad Social (fipro.social@mtas.seg-social.es). In this study, we restrict our empirical analysis to a sample of 16359 male workers enrolled in the General Regime in 1995, that have been working continuously from 1986 to 1994. Descriptive statistics of the variables employed are presented in the table below. (by education) Total High edu Low edu observations (16359) (1472) (14887) mean s.e. mean s.e. mean s.e. -------------------------------------------- % retiring 0.122 0.328 0.0822 0.274 0.1268 0.332 High education 0.0899 0.286 --- --- --- --- Age 58.90 2.96 59.28 3.33 58.86 2.92 Receipt temporary benefits 0.3272 0.469 0.1637 0.370 0.343 0.474 Years of contribution 31.4 5.72 31.76 5.53 31.44 5.73 Wage(a) 2.420 1.56 4.502 2.25 2.215 1.31 Benefit base(a) 2.17 1.02 3.553 1.17 2.030 0.897 Theoretical Benefit(a) 1.33 0.728 2.246 0.947 1.244 0.635 Effective benefit(a) 0.627 0.930 1.17 1.49 0.5730 0.835 (by age group) 55-59 60-64 65-69 observations (9970) (5716) (673) mean s.e. mean s.e. mean s.e. -------------------------------------------- % retiring 0.0342 0.181 0.206 0.405 0.7221 0.448 High education 0.0818 0.270 0.0970 0.296 0.1500 0.357 Age 56.91 1.48 61.58 1.39 65.53 1.16 Receipt temporary benefits 0.3118 0.463 0.3497 0.476 0.3655 0.481 Years of contribution 29.85 5.25 33.90 5.40 34.69 6.27 Wage(a) 2.471 1.61 2.362 1.47 2.165 1.50 Benefit base(a) 2.169 1.03 2.192 0.995 2.092 1.11 Theoretical Benefit(a) 1.178 0.601 1.528 0.770 2.007 1.12 Effective benefit(a) --- --- 1.558 0.741 2.018 1.11 (a): (in 10^6 1995 pta) References: Argimon I. and Gonzalez C. I. (2006) "La muestra continua de vidas laborales de la Seguridad Social", Boletín Económico, May 2006, 41-55. Bank of Spain. Boldrin M., Jimenez-Martin S., and Peracchi F. (2004) "Social Security and Retirement in Spain: microestimation". In Jon Gruber and David Wise, Social Security and Retirement around the World: Microestimation, Chicago University Press for the NBER.