earlier SS depletion date
 

trustees revamping the date, now three years sooner. well, yeah! how long now has the 'payroll tax' cut been on the books? less people employed, the people still employed paying lower amounts into the fund, of course it'll go bust earlier. it's not rocket science.

http://nbcpolitics.msnbc.msn.com/_ne...tion-date?lite


The trustees said that to keep the Social Security trust funds solvent over the next 75 years, Congress could take a number of steps:

•increase the payroll tax rate from its current level of 12.4 percent to 15.01 percent;
•reduce benefits by 16.2 percent;
•find alternative sources of revenue;
•adopt some combination of these approaches.

Or: simply remove the cap. Or heck, just increase it to $250K Too simple, fair and easy?

1983: "We have to raise Social Security rates so we can give the rich a tax cut. Trust us; it'll raise revenue. If it doesn't, we'll TOTALLY pay it back. It's a loan."

(Insert 30 years of surpluses, which were loaned to General Funds to cover the lack of revenue raised by cutting taxes on the rich)

Today: "What? Cutting taxes didn't raise revenues? Well, tough luck. Paying back loans is for suckers. Or the middle class. Same thing. Now we're going to tell you all how Social Security is going insolvent so we can privatize it and take the rest. You fell for it in 1983; you'll fall for it again. Sigh. It's good to be the aristocracy."

i don't agree with privatizing it, but do think they need to make changes to keep it viable.

:tro:

That's perfect :tro:

I've never understood why this isn't discussed more seriously... I won't claim that I've seen the studies that would suggest the impact to SS that removing this cap would have, but it seems to me to be a no-brainer and can improve in some degree, the solvency of SS.


Then again, it would affect the the wealthiest and it doesn't screw the middle class so forget it - it will never be on the table.

Ironically, those that pay more into it reap more at retirement, so removing the cap is not some "rob the rich to give to the poor" scheme.