70 -- SSASIM STATISTICAL MODEL SOFTWARE

The Social Security Administration (SSA) intends to continue leasing six (6) copies of SSASIM Model and GEMINI Software for one (1) year from Policy Simulation Group, Inc (PSI), Washington, DC. Further, the SSASIM and GEMINI licenses will allow SSA to acquire software modifications from PSI as the need arises for more efficient policy valuations in retirement (OASI), disability (DI), and income assistance programs. PSI is the only known source with authority and expertise to provide and modify the "software" as SSA requires. Any other vendor claiming to have requisite authority and expertise to provide or modify the "software" must submit verifiable information that supports such assertion. Conversely, any other vendor that can provide comparable commercial off-the-shelf-(COTS) software must submit verifiable information (i.e., product literature, customer references, and product price) on the relevant capabilities and support for such COTS software. Any suggested COTS software package must be accessible to SSA for at least three (3) years, cost less than $300,000.00, and satisfy the following requirements: General Simulate the impact of policy changes to SSA's Trust Funds, particularly projecting actuarial balances using a similar methodology to that used by the Office of the Chief Actuary. The model will be used to estimate the effects of policy changes on individuals and the economy and as a comparison for program cost projections made by the Office of the Chief Actuary. Below are listed the various elements we require. 1. Activity One: Produce 75-year actuarial cost projections (from baseline data—such as age-gender earnings and gross domestic product---that is obtained for a given year) under alternative calculations. Generate an alternative calculation that literally combines the two Trust Funds (OASI and DI) into a third, theoretical OASDI Trust Fund to produce 75-year actuarial balances. In addition, upon trust fund exhaustion, two alternative discount rate assumptions should be available: (1) rates based on the return that would be realized given the Trust Fund asset allocation policy for that year and (2) rates based on the assumption that an exhausted Trust Fund will simply borrow at the Treasury bond rate from the Treasury's general fund. 2. Activity Two: Specify lifestyle earning profiles for eighteen individuals by birth cohort and simulate a wide variety of OASI program experience statistics for each of them (including the effects of their being married under different policies). The COTS package must allow model to accept a weighting probability for each individual and combine the eighteen individual statistics into an overall (population-like) statistic. The COTS model must be able to run in a stochastic-assumption mode and/or an endogenous-growth mode. The macrosimulation model will also need an embedded cohort model, which uses standard dynamic microsimulation methods with a small, unrepresentative sample of individuals. The cohort model should be embedded inside the macroeconomic model in the sense that the macroeconomic model determines the macroeconomic and demographic environment within which individual lives are simulated. 3. Activity Three: The COTS macroeconomic model must produce estimates of program income and cost for both OASI and DI and must be able to simulate OASI and DI benefits for individuals and families. 4. Activity Four: The COTS model must produce detailed output files for a cohort sample of 100,000 life histories (plus spouses and children) in less than ten minutes on a standard personal computer. Responses to this announcement must be received within ten (10) days after this publication date and should refer to synopsis number 04-1003 .