Social Security won't be able to pay full benefits by 2034, a year earlier than expected due to the pandemic

[kyzr]

The solution is as simple as it gets: Raise the Social Security and Medicare eligibility ages to 70, and index to 9 percent of the population going forward.

I did not pull those numbers out of a hat.

When Social Security was enacted, the average life expectancy was 60. Most people weren't expected to live long enough to collect! Only 5.4% of the population was over 65. That weight was easily handled.

In 1965, when Medicare was enacted, life expectancy was higher and so 9 percent of the population was over 65. Not too bad, and this is where I get the 9 percent figure from.

Today, nearly 16 percent of the population is over 65. A near tripling of the debt load since the enactment of Social Security.

A larger and larger percentage of Americans are dipping into the Treasury while a smaller and smaller percentage of the population is supporting them. This trend is simply unsustainable.

No wonder Social Security is going broke!


We are living DECADES longer than our ancestors. It is common damned sense we should be working longer.

In my opinion, anyone opposed to raising the retirement age is an entitlement leech.

The best solution is to lift the cap and raise the tax 0.50%. That fixes SS permanently.

 

[gipper]

The solution is as simple as it gets: Raise the Social Security and Medicare eligibility ages to 70, and index to 9 percent of the population going forward.

I did not pull those numbers out of a hat.

When Social Security was enacted, the average life expectancy was 60. Most people weren't expected to live long enough to collect! Only 5.4% of the population was over 65. That weight was easily handled.

In 1965, when Medicare was enacted, life expectancy was higher and so 9 percent of the population was over 65. Not too bad, and this is where I get the 9 percent figure from.

Today, nearly 16 percent of the population is over 65. A near tripling of the debt load since the enactment of Social Security.

A larger and larger percentage of Americans are dipping into the Treasury while a smaller and smaller percentage of the population is supporting them. This trend is simply unsustainable.

No wonder Social Security is going broke!


We are living DECADES longer than our ancestors. It is common damned sense we should be working longer.

In my opinion, anyone opposed to raising the retirement age is an entitlement leech.

There are a few problems with that approach. First employers get away with age discrimination now. They easily refuse to hire older workers and often force them out, without any legal repercussions. So your plan would result in a lot of uninsured older Americans. Secondly, our compromised and corrupt healthcare system fails to keep Americans healthy. In fact it works to sicken they as they age. Thus forcing them out of the work force. Thirdly, HC costs in the US negatively effect many older Americans. Exposing Americans aged 65-70 to these costs would greatly harm them.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

The best solution is to lift the cap and raise the tax 0.50%. That fixes SS permanently.

Having other people "pay for it" always works well for those that don't have to.

 

[gipper]

Having other people "pay for it" always works well for those that don't have to.

So you’d rather people who can’t afford it suffer and die.

Yes we must protect the wealthy. They just don’t have enough protections in our crazed crony capitalist right wing Fascist society.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

The solution is as simple as it gets: Raise the Social Security and Medicare eligibility ages to 70, and index to 9 percent of the population going forward.

Yeah, I've watched those jokers on TV making the same claim. Working until 70 is okay when the heaviest thing you have to lift is the mic to clip to your shirt and the earpiece on your ear. But at the age of 63, try spending the day carrying 50 lbs of roof shingles on your shoulders up three stores on a ladder when it's 85 degrees outside with 70% humidity. Or try carrying clamps of bricks to where the bricklayer is laying the brick all day. Maybe being a plumber that has to squeeze into a crawl space to install drain tubes in an old house. Hell, I'll even use my former career as an example. When it's a snow storm where visibility is very limited, do you want to be the guy in the smart car in front of me when I have to bring that 75,000 tractor-trailer to a complete safe stop at the age of 69????

There are a lot of jobs people can barely make it to 65 or 67 years old as it is. I have two cousins, each has their own remodeling business. My one cousin barely made it to retirement after multiple surgeries due to working. My other cousin is still working, but hired people to do the hard labor because he simply can't do it any longer. Their bodies were shot from working years before retirement.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

So you’d rather people who can’t afford it suffer and die.

Yes we must protect the wealthy. They just don’t have enough protections in our crazed crony capitalist right wing Fascist society.

Why should they foot the bill for something many of them will probably never use?

If we want these programs, we have to pay for them. Simple as that. If you don't want to pay for them, we need to work on a plan to phase them out and start something with less flaws. When was the last time we had a SS employee contribution increase in this country? More and more people are living longer and longer, and yet I fail to remember the last employee/ employer contribution increase.

 

[gipper]

Why should they foot the bill for something many of them will probably never use?

If we want these programs, we have to pay for them. Simple as that. If you don't want to pay for them, we need to work on a plan to phase them out and start something with less flaws. When was the last time we had a SS employee contribution increase in this country? More and more people are living longer and longer, and yet I fail to remember the last employee/ employer contribution increase.

Because we don’t want a society where the poor die. Ops, I forgot. You do.

 

[kyzr]

Having other people "pay for it" always works well for those that don't have to.

We all pay into it, having everyone pay the same percentage of their salary is very fair.
You keep whining about my "fix", so you put up yours, or is it to let SS go insolvent in 2033?

 

[Richard-H]

If you steal something you are prosecuted and go to jail. Wealthy people don't steal anything. They don't need to steal anything.

What is and is not theft is determined by the people that make the laws and those who control the people that make the laws - which is usually wealthy people.

Anyone that makes more than a doctor is a defacto thief.

 

[jbander]

The solution is as simple as it gets: Raise the Social Security and Medicare eligibility ages to 70, and index to 9 percent of the population going forward.

I did not pull those numbers out of a hat.

When Social Security was enacted, the average life expectancy was 60. Most people weren't expected to live long enough to collect! Only 5.4% of the population was over 65. That weight was easily handled.

In 1965, when Medicare was enacted, life expectancy was higher and so 9 percent of the population was over 65. Not too bad, and this is where I get the 9 percent figure from.

Today, nearly 16 percent of the population is over 65. A near tripling of the debt load since the enactment of Social Security.

A larger and larger percentage of Americans are dipping into the Treasury while a smaller and smaller percentage of the population is supporting them. This trend is simply unsustainable.

No wonder Social Security is going broke!


We are living DECADES longer than our ancestors. It is common damned sense we should be working longer.

In my opinion, anyone opposed to raising the retirement age is an entitlement leech.

We should be working less not longer, increase income level subject to ss tax. It stops at 137,000.00 now, fixed

 

[jbander]

Having other people "pay for it" always works well for those that don't have to.

Jumping ray the dancing hater. Hates goverment and hates our country but thinks he has the answers. This guy thinks taxes are stealing. He wants us to be the first civilization to operate without taxes, that will be interesting ,that will bring us back to the stone age in just a matter of a few decades. Dancing ray has better idea.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Jumping ray the dancing hater. Hates goverment and hates our country but thinks he has the answers. This guy thinks taxes are stealing. He wants us to be the first civilization to operate without taxes, that will be interesting ,that will bring us back to the stone age in just a matter of a few decades. Dancing ray has better idea.

And what ideas do you have, making up bullshit that people never said?

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

What is and is not theft is determined by the people that make the laws and those who control the people that make the laws - which is usually wealthy people.

Theft has a very simple definition: taking something from somebody else that they own. Government doesn't own money. It doesn't have money. It derives ALL of it's money from taxpaying citizens that do make money.

 

[22lcidw]

Why should they foot the bill for something many of them will probably never use?

If we want these programs, we have to pay for them. Simple as that. If you don't want to pay for them, we need to work on a plan to phase them out and start something with less flaws. When was the last time we had a SS employee contribution increase in this country? More and more people are living longer and longer, and yet I fail to remember the last employee/ employer contribution increase.

Back in the 1980's I was griping to my Father In Law about the then Social Security increases. He told me not to get old. He shut me up. But the projections then was that his was to last at least a few decades longer then now. and the OMB based it on 4% growth or so. We have not come close to that. Also the Baby Boomers are the twice the size in numbers of the oldest generation and Generation X, the one behind the Boomers is half the size.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

We all pay into it, having everyone pay the same percentage of their salary is very fair.
You keep whining about my "fix", so you put up yours, or is it to let SS go insolvent in 2033?

Again, if we want these programs and want to keep these programs, we need to fund these programs. And if we are to lift the cap on how much people have to pay, then it's only fair we lift the cap on how much they can collect. And if we did what's fair, then we gain nothing because people who contribute more will get much more back like other SS contributors and we have the same problem.

Your idea is to make people pay more, but they can't collect any more which is $3,113.00 per month maximum. Even if they do collect under the current system, they sill collect much less than they contributed.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Because we don’t want a society where the poor die. Ops, I forgot. You do.

No, what I want is a large enough contribution percentage increase from the people who are going to benefit from the program so it will be funded when they get older.

 

[kyzr]

Again, if we want these programs and want to keep these programs, we need to fund these programs. And if we are to lift the cap on how much people have to pay, then it's only fair we lift the cap on how much they can collect. And if we did what's fair, then we gain nothing because people who contribute more will get much more back like other SS contributors and we have the same problem.

Your idea is to make people pay more, but they can't collect any more which is $3,113.00 per month maximum. Even if they do collect under the current system, they sill collect much less than they contributed.

You posted opposition to lifting the cap but dodged a real fix.
So you want SS to go insolvent in 2033 and we all get 76% of promised benefits.
Epic fail.
Lift the fucking cap, the wealthy won't end up in bread lines, and SS will be fully funded.
Just read your post #276, so you want to raise the SS tax so everyone pays more in, how generous of you to take more tax from the lower and middle incomes than the wealthy.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

You posted opposition to lifting the cap but dodged a real fix.

The problem with you people is every time there is a problem, the "real" fix to you is make other people pay for it.

If you want to keep the program, YOU contribute more to the program to fix it.

 

[kaz]

Canada has a similar problem but a longer horizon. This is why people like me despise crony capitalism. It's often just theft. Help out small to medium sized innovative companies not massive multi-billion dollar companies.

What happens if this prediction comes to fruition?

Social Security won't be able to pay full benefits by 2034, a year earlier than expected due to the pandemic | CNN Politics

Social Security will have to cut benefits by 2034 if Congress does nothing to address the program's long-term funding shortfall, according to an annual report released Tuesday by the Social Security and Medicare trustees.

www.cnn.com

Washington (CNN)Social Security will have to cut benefits by 2034 if Congress does nothing to address the program's long-term funding shortfall, according to an annual report released Tuesday by the Social Security and Medicare trustees.

That's one year earlier than reported last year. By that time, the combined trust funds for Social Security will be depleted and will be able to pay only 78% in promised benefits to retirees and disabled beneficiaries.

The Covid-19 pandemic and economic recession are to blame for moving up the depletion rate by a year, driven by the big drop in employment and resulting decline in revenue from payroll taxes. The trustees also project a higher mortality rate through 2023 and a delay in births in the short term.

But it remains unclear what the long-term effects of the pandemic will be on the funds and the trustees will continue to monitor developments. Last year's report did not take into account the effects of the pandemic.

The projections for Medicare are roughly on par with last year's report.

The trust fund for Medicare Part A, which covers hospital and nursing home costs for seniors, will be depleted by 2026, the same year as reported last year. At that point the program would only be able to pay out 91% of promised benefits.

This whole thing is a farce. There is no social security trust fund. There is no money in it now

 

[kaz]

You posted opposition to lifting the cap but dodged a real fix.
So you want SS to go insolvent in 2033 and we all get 76% of promised benefits.
Epic fail.
Lift the fucking cap, the wealthy won't end up in bread lines, and SS will be fully funded.
Just read your post #276, so you want to raise the SS tax so everyone pays more in, how generous of you to take more tax from the lower and middle incomes than the wealthy.

Since there is no actual money, social security is insolvent now