(Photo credit: Flickr user DonkeyHotey)
It’s a common refrain among Washington policymakers that Social Security must be cut. Even though the program is solvent decades out into the future and could be completely protected by simply raising the payroll tax cap, calls for cutting the program persist.
But Duncan Black — the blogger who writes under the handle “Atrios” — nails the true issue with Social Security in a recent USA Today op-ed. The program is actually not generous enough:
As the system exists, large numbers of Americans nearing retirement will have little more than fairly meager Social Security benefits (the average benefit for retired workers is currently $1230) to survive on in their old age. We can doom them to a life of insecurity and relative poverty or we can take the obvious step to improve their lives: Increase Social Security benefits.
The goal of a retirement system should be to ensure that retired people have sufficient income to live out the remainder of their lives without a radical reduction in quality of life after they stop working. Our current system, a modest mandatory government retirement program combined with individual savings, is failing to do that. Strengthen Social Security now, not by cutting benefits, but by increasing them.
We pointed out recently that nearly a fifth of Americans 65 and older are still working past the official “retirement age.” And leading economists have pointed out that lowering the retirement age would also increase employment. If we truly want to live in a country that treats its seniors well in retirement, we should be talking about protecting and expanding this successful system, not cutting it.
Sign our letter to President Obama opposing any cuts to Social Security by clicking here.Ai??
Atrios misses the point of Social Security. By saying it needs to be increased, he is looking at it as a source to fund a persons retirement. This is not what Social Security was designed for, nor is it what social securiy has evolved into. As I understand it, Social Security is designed to protect citizens when they encounter social situations that make it difficult for them to provide for themselves. These protections include unemployment, old age and disability.
Basically the stated purpose of social security is to be a supplement to retirment savings and a fail safe for tragic events. But unfortunately people are trying to hold the government responsible for their well being. I believe it is the personal responsibility of each citizen to save a portion of their income for retirement. The people who choose not to do this must pay the price for their choice to spend more today by having less when they retire.
Sure, BKu, it would be nice to save a portion of one’s income for retirement. But what if one cannot because expenses nearly equal income? Or let’s address some specific cases: My friend Chris is not yet 30 but he cannot work because he has renal failure that puts him in dialysis every other day. He is married and his wife has a part-time job. After two years of struggling with this, he just received Disability. They survive week-to-week. Then, there was my father who worked for the same company for two decades and paid into a retirement fund from every paycheck. When the company closed in 1966, that retirement fund paid him $18 a month because owners had been embezzling from it for years. He tried to find other work but no one would hire him because he was over 40. He could not obtain social security since he was not 65 or unemployment past 13 weeks. He died at age 64. And here I am: I am past 65 now and eligible but I am still working and paying into the fund because the monthly benefits combined with my daughter’s salary would not be enough to furnish us with necessities.
Yes, people have responsibility for themselves and do need to take care of themselves … I complain a lot about how some of my friends make irresponsible choices to drink dark sodas or spend savings because a family member in another state insists on attendance at a wedding or will not rest even one day after being trampled by a horse. But we also live in a community (America is a society) and have ethical obligations to help one another. Social Security is a national effort to take care of one another within this very large community but it is failing to do that.
Oh boy, I could definitely use it, but I’m not holding my breath. I’ll celebrate if and when and cross my fingers until then.