This year Social Security will pay out more than it receives in payroll taxes. Moreover, spending on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid is utterly out of control. In another twenty- five years these three programs alone will consume nearly the entire portion of the economy we spend on government. Health care and retirement spending is going to swallow the entire Federal Government.
And here’s the main reason why that this sorry state of skyrocketing debt will grow much worse. The 77 million Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, will begin to reach age 65 next year. Add them to the Medicare and Social Security rolls and you get Armageddon.
But the politics of dealing with these programs in a constructive and fiscally sound way has been radioactive for decades. And, while it is the case that both political parties are at fault, the hard fact of the matter is that the Democrats deserve more of the blame for the paralysis.
They are the ones who figured out decades ago that they could lock down the votes of seniors by terrifying them. They did it by saying that the Republicans were out to destroy Medicare and Social Security. Seniors bought the big lie hook, line, and sinker. That is why today millions of seniors oppose any change to either program.
Make no changes in Medicare or Social Security and only one thing is certain— Medicare will go belly up in 2017 and by 2037 all of Social Security’s reserves will have been drained and the income flowing into the program will only be enough to pay 75% of the scheduled benefits. Did you hear that senior citizens? You’ve been sold snake oil. Your self-interest and the nation’s self interest require the reform of both of these programs in order to preserve them.
And here’s some good news. It’s possible to fix both of these programs without imposing the necessary pain on current recipients. Did you hear that seniors?
Maybe the Chairmen of the President’s Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, think their work is about finished now that they have come forward with their bold and urgently necessary recommendations. Wrong.
What they need to do during the next two years is to take their Report on the road all across America. They need to hold public hearings to educate the nation on why these changes must be made.
You probably don’t know much about Bowles and Simpson. Know this. One is a Democrat and the other is a Republican. Both are smart, reasonable, and tough. Each knows that he must have the trust and cooperation of the other in order to succeed. Both are honest. And both are patriots first and politicians second.
LeRoy Goldman
November 19, 2010
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