The COVID-19 pandemic triggered a large and immediate drop in employment among U.S. workers, along with major expansions of unemployment insurance (UI) and work from home. We use Current Population Survey and Social Security application data to study employment among older adults and their participation in disability and retirement insurance programs through the second year of the pandemic. We find ongoing improvements in employment outcomes among older workers in the labor force, along with sustained higher levels in the share no longer in the labor force during this period. Applications for Social Security disability benefits remain depressed, particularly for Supplemental Security Income. In models accounting for the expiration of expanded UI, we find some evidence that the loss of these additional financial supports resulted in an increase in disability claiming. Social Security retirement benefit claiming is approximately 3% higher during the second year of the pandemic.

The work of southern sociologist Thomas Jackson Woofter Jr. (1893–1972) is frequently cited by American historians, but his contribution to government policy on agriculture in the New Deal, Social Security in the 1940s, and demography in the Cold War remains underappreciated. He left the University of North Carolina to direct government research on rural relief in the 1930s, Social Security enhancement during and after World War II, and foreign population and manpower projections during the Cold War. Contributing to the delivery of essential programs in key agencies, he participated in internal and external debates over policy and social attitudes between 1930 and 1960. Woofter worked for the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, the Works Progress Administration, the Farm Security Agency, the Federal Security Agency, and the Central Intelligence Agency, improving data-gathering and assisting transitions in federal policymaking. This article assesses his role in those agencies, using official records, other primary materials, and secondary sources.