Among scholars and others there is some dispute as to whether Social Security needs to be repaired at all. If we assume that it does need repair, how best to do it? The Washington Post is examining several of the top options. Among them are two of the most popular: raising the retirement age and taxing income at higher levels. Naturally, neither solution is ideal. Raising the retirement age has some intuitive appeal. The American economy is moving away from labor jobs and into technological jobs. It makes sense that the more sedentary a job is, the longer a worker could do it. But, this would still leave a lot of factory workers and stone masons in the workforce long after their bodies have worn out. Raising the amount of income subject to Social Security taxes is probably a better idea. But trouble awaits. Social Security caps the amount of monthly benefits available to beneficiaries, For high-income workers, the gap between what they pay in and the maximum amount they can get back each month is already pronounced. If gap grows further, there will be no meaningful correlation between the two. This promotes the notion that Social Security is not a true retirement program. Rather, it starts to look like a flat tax on earnings. The less workers feel invested in the program, the more likely they are not going to support Social Security. So, neither of these ideas is going to work very well. So what alternatives are there?
How To Fix Social Security
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