AP: WHY IT MATTERS: Social Security

[Omaha Steve]

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20120930/DA1K8FT00.html

By STEPHEN OHLEMACHER

The issue:

Unless Congress acts, the trust funds that support Social Security will run out of money in 2033, according to the trustees who oversee the retirement and disability program. At that point, Social Security would collect only enough tax revenue each year to pay about 75 percent of benefits. That benefit cut wouldn't sit well with the millions of older Americans who rely on Social Security for most of their income.

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Where they stand:

President Barack Obama hasn't laid out a detailed plan for addressing Social Security. He's called for bipartisan talks on strengthening the program but he didn't embrace the plan produced by a bipartisan deficit reduction panel he created in 2010.

Republican challenger Mitt Romney proposes a gradual increase in the retirement age to account for growing life expectancy. For future generations, Romney would slow the growth of benefits "for those with higher incomes."

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Why it matters:

For millions of retired and disabled workers, Social Security is pretty much all they have to live on, even though monthly benefits are barely enough to keep them out of poverty. Monthly payments average $1,237 for retired workers and $1,111 for disabled workers. Most older Americans rely on Social Security for a majority of their income; many rely on it for 90 percent or more, according to the Social Security Administration.

FULL story at link.


In this Sept. 21, 2011, file photo Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney talks to participants at a town hall meeting in Miami. Romney discussed his plans to improve the economy, create jobs and protect Social Security. For Social Security Romney proposes a gradual increase in the retirement age to account for growing life expectancy. For future generations, Romney would slow the growth of benefits "for those with higher incomes." (AP Photo/Alan Diaz, File)

[Thinkingabout]

1. The Social Security Trust fund is why Romney is running.

It is probably in his plan to raid it.

On a serious note there are going to have some adjustments made in the trust fund on order to provide payments needed by seniors. I am active in a senior group and they are scared. Also the voucher program for Medicare does not have merit in the real world. If Medicare could be paid for with the amount Ryan proposed it would be a deal but it won't happen. To put pharmacy portion of Medicare on competing basis it would save bog bucks every year. We need to be smarter.

[1-Old-Man]

15. Social Security is the Golden Ticket, the ultimate cash cow, plunder-near-unlimited.

[woo me with science]

16. We will see plundering of SS and education both

if we don't start being extremely vocal right now.

[closeupready]

19. That's exactly right. His Wall Street cronies will fee the trust fund to death

just like rMoney did with pension funds and company assets he raided in the last 20 years.

[rgbecker]

2. I believe Obama has proposed that the cap on earned income be increased.

Presently, those earning more than $106,000 or so do not pay FICA tax on the amount over that. Obama, from the beginning has suggested that cap be raised. Also it has been suggested the tax be paid on unearned income also, as most high income earners are benefiting from tax rates that tax those incomes at rates less than "Earned" income. True, Obama has rejected the idea of increasing retirement age as he knows that for many workers, especially those earning their living by making "Earned" income, working beyond 66 is not easy to do. I'm talking manual laborers, teachers etc. not office workers or executives.

Obama doesn't need to lay out ways to gut the social security system, the Republicans will do it for him. Obama should continue to stand firm for workers rights to an old age with dignity.

This AP article is just one more over simplified rendition of GOP talking points without any information that addresses the problem it so clearly lays out.

[SheilaT]

3. Raising the cap, as I understand it,

is probably the easiest and best way to keep SS solvent.

And actually, full retirement age is going to rise, until it's age 67 for those born after 1960.

But you are right that there are many jobs that are physically demanding and are difficult to stay in for so long.

I also think that people who have office jobs, and those who have jobs that they truly love, don't understand how unpleasant work can be.

[magical thyme]

10. another issue with raising the retirement age

even office workers who are physically capable of working are not necessarily able to find work. If you are laid off around 50, good luck getting rehired in a serious recession. And the older you are after that, the more the odds are against you.

By the time you either find work or get retrained in a supposedly growing field (which can change by the time you finish the training anyway), you may run through a significant portion of what was supposed to be your retirement savings.

[woo me with science]

12. He also proposed a chained CPI. That is why we need specifics from him.

No more Grand Bargain, ever again.

[PSPS]

4. "for those with higher incomes" = welfare program

For future generations, Romney would slow the growth of benefits "for those with higher incomes."

Very bad idea. This is essentially means testing -- something specifically avoided by FDR so Social Security would never become a welfare program.

As others have pointed out, simply raise the cap on earnings subject to FICA. Problem solved. Forever.

Also, the AP should be ashamed of themselves for saying, "Social Security will run out of money in 2033" and "Social Security would collect only enough tax revenue each year to pay about 75 percent of benefits." Besides being incongruous, these statements make a lot of assumptions that are not widely believed.

[B Calm]

5. Just raise the damn cap! Oh for christ sakes!!

Why in hell do they make such a big fucking deal out of this?

[area51]

8. +1

The cap must be raised. It seems no one has the balls to do it.

[woo me with science]

14. Theater...

Amen to your post.

But we will be fed the theater....because the plan by the one percent who pour money into both parties is and has been to steal the money. All roads lead to the new Grand Bargain, in which we will be fed the inexcusable LIE that we need "compromise" here...in the form of slowing or cuts to benefits, probably through the same chained CPI that Obama offered last year.

That is why it is so important to speak out now and demand specific responses from Democrats, including specific promises to rule out chained CPI and increasing the taxable percentage of benefits...because Democrats are the ONLY ones who can stand between seniors and these despicable cuts.

Obama's glaring avoidance of these specific promises telegraphs a serious problem in our party. We need to demand clarity.

It is not too much to ask that the Democratic President and candidate for a second term promise not to ATTACK Social Security.

[TeamPooka]

6. Great book: THE PLOT AGAINST SOCIAL SECURITY by Michael Hiltzik....

Hiltzik is a Pulitzer Prize winning writer
http://www.amazon.com/The-Plot-Against-Social-Security/dp/B000ENBRGY/ref=pd_ybh_1

[HiPointDem]

7. 1/3 of retirees rely on SS for 90%+ of their income; 2/3 rely on it for more than half of their

income.

IOW, the majority of retirees would be poor or outright destitute if not for SS. Only 1/3 of retirees lead anything approaching the "high life" we hear about so often.

[woo me with science]

13. Thank you.

It is critical that people remember why SS NEVER should be again, a bargaining chip.

[woo me with science]

9. We must demand that Obama/Biden take chained CPI off the table explicitly.

Obama proposed the chained CPI last year and has defended it strongly. http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=1136433

Promising that the Social Security program itself will not be changed, as Biden did in August, is not enough. Backers of the chained CPI have often defended it by using a word game....arguing that it is not a change to Social Security. It does not change the SS program itself, but it lowers projected benefits by changing the formula used to calculate SS benefits. It is viciously harmful to seniors, because it cuts projected benefits increasingly severely over time and is BUILT on the assumption that money can be saved by forcing seniors to accept lower quality substitutes on their grocery lists.

And McIntosh has pointed out another trick that Obama/Biden need to reject specifically: reducing SS benefits by increasing the taxable percentage of those benefits: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021133426#post24

If Democrats are running as the defenders of Americans in this race and portraying themselves as the antithesis of the candidates who will attack safety nets, it is imperative that we demand these promises, and that we demand they be made explicitly.

Obama and Biden owe it to Americans to make it clear that Romney/Ryan are the ONLY ones in this race who pose a threat to the well-being and the desperately needed safety nets of the American people. It is the bare MINIMUM that they should be able to promise: not even that they promise to IMPROVE the safety nets, but that they promise not to ATTACK them.

No more "Grand Bargain," ever again.

[woo me with science]

11. Where are the promises from Obama/Biden not to cut or slow benefits?

Where are the promises that the despicable chained CPI is off the table, and that any effort to make a greater percentage of SS benefits taxable is off the table?

Why the refusal to be specific about these things?

Note that this is not even a request to *improve* already meager and insufficient SS benefits.

It is merely an expectation that the Democratic nominee for President, running as the anti-Romney and the protector of social safety nets....promise not to ATTACK them.

That is not too much to ask, that the Democratic nominee for President promise not to ATTACK Social Security.

The refusal to make these specific promises telegraphs a serious problem, with Grand Bargain redux coming down the pike. Keep pushing and demanding specific responses. We need representation now.

[woo me with science]

17. Kick

[closeupready]

18. Raise taxes. Problem solved. Duh.

nt

[woo me with science]

20. Kick.

[woo me with science]

21. kick