Private sector employees contribute 6.2 percent of their gross pay to Social Security and their employers contribute another 6.2 percent. Self-employed workers contribute 12.4 percent.

Statewide in 2008, 12,933 of the 186,700 retired public employees, including city, town and state workers and  teachers, received accidental disability benefits. That’s 6.9 percent.

In 1983, 62 percent of  American workers were  covered by a defined benefit retirement plan and 12 percent  had defined contribution plans.  By 2007, the numbers had flip- flopped, with 17 percent covered by defined benefit and 63 percent by defined contribution plans.

About 75 percent of U.S. police, firefighters and EMTs prehypertension or hypertension, according to a 2008 study published in the American Journal of Hypertension. The study attributed the numbers to several factors including the physical and emotional stresses of the job and obesity rates.