Does SCSEP Eligibility Increase Employment Among Older Workers?\ Regression Discontinuity Analysis of the Age 55 Threshold

Abstract

The Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP) provides subsidized part-time employment to low-income adults age 55 and older, serving approximately 40,000 participants annually with \$400 million in federal funding. Despite its scale and nearly 60-year history, rigorous causal evaluations of SCSEP remain scarce. This paper exploits the program's sharp age 55 eligibility threshold using a regression discontinuity design with Census American Community Survey data from 2019-2022. Analyzing over 550,000 low-income individuals aged 50-60, I find no evidence of a discontinuous change in employment at age 55. Employment rates decline smoothly with age at approximately 1.5-2.0 percentage points per year, with the 54-to-55 transition showing no additional deviation from this trend. Placebo tests at ages 52, 53, 54, 56, 57, and 58 yield similar-sized effects, confirming the absence of a true discontinuity. This null result is consistent with SCSEP's extremely low take-up rate—less than 0.1% of the eligible population participates—generating an intent-to-treat effect below detection thresholds. The findings suggest that while SCSEP may benefit its participants, eligibility for the program does not produce detectable population-level employment effects among low-income older workers.