Income replacement during sickness, 1948-78.

Estimates have been published by the Social Security Administration for each year beginning with 1948 on cash benefits to replace the income loss associated with illness or accidents suffered away from work. The benefits paid by plans included in this series were recorded at $0.8 billion in 1948. By 1978, benefits paid reached $11.7 billion. The rate of income replacement achieved by these benefits also grew markedly from 17 percent in 1948 to 36 percent in 1978. As the fourth decade of the series begins, the most prominent issues are: Availability of maternity benefits, concern about appropriate tax treatment of benefits, and the still unresolved question of whether and how to provide a national system of income-loss protection against sickness.