Social Security, do we need it? Is it desirable?
As my friend Chad pointed out in an article yesterday, this election year we are likely to be bombarded with a lot of political talking points about Social Security and why you should vote for one candidate and not another.
The USA has had, and has expanded, the Social Security program for so long that most people just assume it is their right to Social Security. As Chad pointed out, this type of social program was never intended or spelled out by the founding fathers when they wrote the constitution.
But even if the government isn’t supposed to be doing this, is it actually good? Is it desirable?
Obviously those of us who have paid a staggering amount into Social Security would like to at least get a little something for retirement.
My view is that it’s not a bad thing for the government to be socially responsible, but all of our current social programs are seriously flawed!
Many people feel they have paid into Social Security and they get back what they paid in. Thus one argument against Social Security is that each person could have done a better job of saving and investing their own money. They are mistaken. The system was always designed such that younger workers pay for the current benefits of the currently retired.
Certainly we shouldn’t have to live with the fear that after paying in for our entire career, we might not get any benefits. I don’t think the Social Security program will ever collapse. What they will do again is reduce the benefits and increase the tax.
I’m not even going to touch on the disability aspect of the Social Security program.
Social Security does have some aspects of wealth redistribution but in a rather messed up way. After a certain income level, people are no longer paying more Social Security. Thus for the wealthy they pay a smaller portion of their income for Social Security tax. For the lower income people, the benefit amounts are weak but they also didn’t pay much in. Another complication is that if you are wealthy (high income) when you retire then 85% of your Social Security benefits are taxed again. Tax upon income that was already taxed!
I’ve stated before that I think all of our “social” programs need to be replaced with a single universal income program. Sure that sounds like “socialism”, but in my mind it really isn’t. The benefit is to replace a ton of extremely flawed systems with a single, simple system. The cost savings from increased efficiency should go a long way toward reducing our tax burden!
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe we could go back to a culture more like the rest of the world where the family and the elderly are respected. But that doesn’t seem to be the American nature. We are fiercely independent (well at least a lot of us were raised that way). But is the expectation that children and family will take care of each other? What about people without children? What about family quarrels? Wouldn’t this also restrict our mobility? You wouldn’t be able to move away from your children.
Above all, we need to teach financial responsibility. Many lessons are only learned the hard first hand way, but we sure could do a better job of teaching our young about money and finances! Heck, let’s teach the entire population so we stop being fools using fiat money, return to a gold standard, have responsible government and keep inflation at a trivial level.
Keep in mind that when Social Security was first implemented the tax rate was 2%, now it is 15.3% - a huge increase in burden! And this burden falls on the average worker! Once you reach $168,600 annual income, anything above that is not taxed for Social Security. Our tax laws are too convoluted.
Keep in mind that “democracy” and “freedom” are opposites as the minority is not free. For a gov-ernment to be “socially responsible” requires funds which it must obtain from the citizens. These funds are not freely given but forcibly extracted. It is not freedom, but it is socialism.
As you point out and I did in detail in my comment on Chad’s article, it is the younger generation pay-ing the older generation. The government is forcing you to pay for others that you have no relation-ship with besides under the same government. However, my arguments do not come from the Con-stitution or what is “fair”, but what the Bible makes clear. As I described, for the follower of Christ we must pay into the system, but taking the “benefits” is theft.