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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (707)	6/14/2005 12:10:56 AM
From: Peter Dierks	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 541530

"Our society is not inclined to allow people to exist in abject poverty." There is a difference between 1) the government universally sending monthly checks when people retire to prevent their ending up in poverty and 2)letting them do their thing and then, if some squander their money and end up in poverty, sending the squanderers monthly checks to get them out of poverty. I'm asking why the former is better than the latter. Morally, I am not sure there is a difference. Practically, how can we be sure that a person is suffering from poverty to know when to start aid? What if they are just too proud to ask? I believe that every person who has worked and saved for their retirement deserves some sort of a retirement if they reach a reasonable age. One obvious aberration is that when Social Security was first proposed the average retiree (if they lived that long) lived something like 18 months. We could change the retirement age to 70 next year and it would not be close to the same effect. IMO we need a plan for the retirement of Generation-X and beyond. The plan that their kids will pay for it cannot last forever. At some time the next generation will just say no. That is why I think we need to do something now to make a more permanent fix for Social Security than turning the other cheek.