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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (212001)	11/18/2004 7:11:40 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1573924

Increase 10% on the current FICA tax, not on the wage. That is a little more reasonable. It is still something that would have negative consequences but we may be forced in to that or even a bigger increase. I think it could be avoided if some changes where made but I don't think enough changes will be made to avoid an increase. I do think that there is going to be a huge political battle in the future between the retirees and those near retirement who say no to any cuts and the workers who will be asked to pay too much. A point of semi-agreement, I'm surprised. I have long maintained that benefits need to be reduced. And I don't see any reason to make government handouts to the wealthy through social security. Cuts will have to be made and it would be better to cut the payments to the wealthy than the poor. Some cuts will probably have to be made to the middle class payments as well as there are not enough wealthy people. Privatizing a portion of SS won't save it It won't save it. As I said before the plan is neither a panacea nor a disaster. Its a change at the margin. Changes at the margin don't erase a mess like social security. I gave you my plan, marginally raise FICA tax and eliminate (your idea of a phase out is probably a good one) benefits for those with substantial retirement income. There is some problem with providing a disincentive for people to save for their own retirement but if the phase out is gradual the disincentive might not be too large. Cutting all benefits eliminates this moral hazard but in practice could be very harsh. I'd have to think about whether I would put some ceiling on social security benefits that is lower than the current one. I'm leaning to supporting that idea, but the reduction would probably not be low enough to eliminate the phase out and still have a solvent social security system without unduly burdening the working population, so we might need both. Most of all I think we should raise the retirement age. I don't think we should raise the retirement age. Hell, the people in this country work harder and longer hours than almost anywhere in the world... they should be able to kick back at age 65 if they want to. Many can't function in their former capacity, especially if it involved physical labor. They built the country that younger folks are enjoying, with their taxes and with their labor, give them a break. When social security was instituted few people lived long past 65 so that was a workable age. With the continuing extension of the average life time it makes less sense. If people save up enough ant they want to kick back at 65, or 45, more power to them but I don't think it should be on the governments bill. In 1940 the average life span was less than than social securities retirement age, now it is more than a decade over the retirement age. "U.S. Trends In the United States, the proportion of the population aged >65 years is projected to increase from 12.4% in 2000 to 19.6% in 2030 (3). The number of persons aged >65 years is expected to increase from approximately 35 million in 2000 to an estimated 71 million in 2030 (3), and the number of persons aged >80 years is expected to increase from 9.3 million in 2000 to 19.5 million in 2030 (3)" cdc.gov And that projection includes just regular normal changes, no exceptional breakthroughs in combating aging and age related diseases. And it should keep increasing after 2030. The retirement age should reflect that reality. Its one thing if a small percentage of the population lives on government support for a few years, its quite another if scores of millions of people spend decades relying on the government, and that doesn't even include disability payments and welfare. Tim