Battle over Mandatory (aka “Entitlement”) Spending

[UNCatTech]

“… In a tense Tuesday meeting, DOGE staff grilled SSA officials about phone fraud and proposed shifting all claims processing to online channels and in-person offices, according to The Post.

SSA employees floated possible solutions, but DOGE wasn’t “interested in anything else but defending the decision that they had already made,” a source familiar told the [Washington Post].

… The Post reported on DOGE’s proposal to slash SSA’s telephone services on Wednesday afternoon. Hours later, the agency said in a statement that media reports were “inaccurate.”

DOGE confirmed on X, however, that the administration would still push forward with one part of its proposal: Customers will no longer be allowed to change their direct deposit routing number and other bank information by phone. …”

This would kill my mother.

Since my dad died we've been helping her contact companies and work through necessary changes. She wants to do everything like it's 1980. Phone calls, mail, checks, paper bills, etc.

She struggles to log onto the computer and check email.

 

[ZenMode]

Right, there were labor-intensive jobs in 1935 and there are labor-intensive jobs now. Any number of things contribute to life expectancy, but the fact remains that the retirement age isn't keeping pace with life expectancy.

One of the dumbest comparisons ever made on this board. Most of the labor intensive jobs now are considerably less common and less strenuous that they were even 45 years ago. Hand labor on foundations is clearing out corners after a backhoe, not using picks, shovels and wheelbarrows to dig 6 feet deep in rock and clay. You don't carry shingles up a ladder. Either they go up a ladder lift or put on a roof with a boom truck. Forklifts move lumber, plywood and drywall.

"Most of the labor intensive jobs now are considerably less common and less strenuous that they were even 45 years ago. "

I never said they were AS labor intensive, jackass. I simply said there WERE labor intensive jobs then AND there are labor intensive jobs now.

Do you disagree that labor-intensive jobs still exist?

I didn't think so.

 

[finesse]

"Most of the labor intensive jobs now are considerably less common and less strenuous that they were even 45 years ago. "

I never said they were AS labor intensive, jackass. I simply said there WERE labor intensive jobs then AND there are labor intensive jobs now.

Do you disagree that labor-intensive jobs still exist?

I didn't think so.

Do you compare 90 year old cars to current ones? Or do you you figure that technological changes have made that worthless? I don't think so.

How about cancer treatment?

You never say anything committal but you imply a lot. Esse quam videri was not meant for people who play the fool.

 

[ZenMode]

Do you compare 90 year old cars to current ones? Or do you you figure that technological changes have made that worthless? I don't think so.

How about cancer treatment?

You never say anything committal but you imply a lot. Esse quam videri was not meant for people who play the fool.

You aren't moving the goalposts.

This is the post I replied to:

"Any potential benefit cuts associated with increasing the retirement age would be unfairly borne by low-income workers who were more likely to have worked in labor-intensive industries, and are less likely to live and collect Social Security."

Even if the situations aren't identical, which they aren't, labor-intensive jobs still exist today just as labor-intensive existed when SS was out into place in 1935, so the mere existence of labor-intensive jobs shouldn't be a factor when talking about raising the retirement age.

 

[dukeman92]

Right, there were labor-intensive jobs in 1935 and there are labor-intensive jobs now. Any number of things contribute to life expectancy, but the fact remains that the retirement age isn't keeping pace with life expectancy.

The other issue is that modern medicine keeps people alive when they would have otherwise died but at an extremely high cost.

I don't know how many times I have to say it, but I guess I will for as many times as you feel the need to respond. You haven't provided me with any information I didn't already know. I've yet to hear a legitimate reason to raise the retirement age. It's a non-starter for me.

 

[ZenMode]

I don't know how many times I have to say it, but I guess I will for as many times as you feel the need to respond. You haven't provided me with any information I didn't already know. I've yet to hear a legitimate reason to raise the retirement age. It's a non-starter for me.

Right, the reason you have for it being a non-starter is because of the existence of labor-intensive jobs.

I don't see how that matters given that there have always been labor-intensive jobs.

 

[nycfan]

This would kill my mother.

Since my dad died we've been helping her contact companies and work through necessary changes. She wants to do everything like it's 1980. Phone calls, mail, checks, paper bills, etc.

She struggles to log onto the computer and check email.

My mom is the same except she has mental decline so she simply cannot understand how to do anything online (like trying to tell
me whether a “threatening letter from the bank” is an email or a text as a staring point and can’t recall how to forward an email or take a screenshot) but she still knows how to write a check and wait on hold to talk to someone.

 

[Icky Mettle]

When the original retirement age was set in 1935 (65 years old) the average life expectancy was 62.

Full retirement is 67 today, with an average life expectancy of 77.

You’re looking at it wrong. You’re looking at life expectancy at birth. The life expectancy at birth in 1935 was much more heavily impacted by higher infant/childhood mortality rates than it is now. There is much less of a difference in life expectancy for people who reached the age of 65 in 1935 and those who have reached the age of 65 now. When social security was designed, the life expectancy for those who reached the age of 65 was contemplated rather than life expectancy at birth.

Now it is true that as a whole, people who reach the age of 65 now are living longer than people who reached the age of 65 eighty years ago, but the difference is not nearly as significant as that of life expectancy at birth. It is also true that with population increase, there are a lot more people alive today over the age of 65 than there were eighty years ago.

 

[ZenMode]

You’re looking at it wrong. You’re looking at life expectancy at birth. The life expectancy at birth in 1935 was much more heavily impacted by higher infant/childhood mortality rates than it is now. There is much less of a difference in life expectancy for people who reached the age of 65 in 1935 and those who have reached the age of 65 now. When social security was designed, the life expectancy for those who reached the age of 65 was contemplated rather than life expectancy at birth.

Now it is true that as a whole, people who reach the age of 65 now are living longer than people who reached the age of 65 eighty years ago, but the difference is not nearly as significant as that of life expectancy at birth. It is also true that with population increase, there are a lot more people alive today over the age of 65 than there were eighty years ago.

Sure. Any number of factors contribute to life expectancy. Infant mortality probably skewed the numbers at one point in time. Seatbelt laws may have had a small impact. Gun deaths....drug usage.... it's all a factor to varying degrees, but, at least according to SSA.gov, a higher and higher percentage are living longer.

I don't see any reason, given technology, job safety, medicine etc that this trend wouldn't continue.

Social Security History

 

[Huh?]

I'm not following. Are you saying that it wouldn't be paid between the current cap and $400k?

Yep.

 

[grimes70]

Another factor is ageism in hiring. Anecdotal from people I know but this is my sister's case,

Laid off at age 60. Marketing profressional working in fairly large high tech. Her biggest concern was health care. Spent over a year trying to find a job, slowly searching all over with much less salary, etc. Got a few part time offers not worth the pay. She eventually said f*ck, it. Got expensive cobra Obama care, cut down on expenses and waiting for Medicare to kick in. Readjusting SS payouts. In todays world do you take it as soon as possible and hope you get grandfathered in orr do you wait to cash out at a later age? No one knows in this bozo world MAGAs put us in.

She, like many on this board are fortunate to have the resources to do this.

ETA so instead of money going into SS for a few more years there will be an earlier payout.

 

[Huh?]

How about the principle of it? People should be spending their later years traveling, being with family, and enjoying life. Not working. Let’s lower the retirement age and expand benefits.

Society and government have allowed us to live longer, so we should give that time to break our bodies further and fuel profits for corporations? And we don’t even get pensions anymore? FOH.

I disagree with this entirely. If you've planned properly, have at it, you've earned it.

But we need to start investing more in our younger people rather than asking them to subsidize the retirement of our dreams.

 

[grimes70]

How about the principle of it? People should be spending their later years traveling, being with family, and enjoying life. Not working. Let’s lower the retirement age and expand benefits.

A nice principal but no, people do not need to travel. Enough money for food and housing with a bit more for other expenses, (insurance, phone,today's necessities) yes.

 

[ZenMode]

A nice principal but no, people do not need to travel. Enough money for food and housing with a bit more for other expenses, (insurance, phone,today's necessities) yes.

Agree with this and @Huh? . I have no issue with retiring IF you can do so, on your own, before social security benefits kick in, but the current retirement age for SS needs to be kept in line with life expectancy.

 

[Huh?]

You said “retirement of our dreams”, not me.

Social security is currently barely fulfilling its design as a social insurance program. I’m not saying that we increase the social security tax burden on younger people, I’m suggesting we increase the amount the wealthy pay in.

People deserve a dignified retirement regardless of whether you think they’ve “earned it.”

Social security was originally designed as a supplemental income program. If you change that definition, you are asking (young) working people to subsidize that change. I firmly believe that is antithetical to good national policy.

 

[nycfan]

Agree with this and @Huh? . I have no issue with retiring IF you can do so, on your own, before social security benefits kick in, but the current retirement age for SS needs to be kept in line with life expectancy.

Are you saying the SSA retirement age should be raised until at or after current life-expectancy? My mom retired at 68. She is about to turn 80. She was barely able to manage a HS class at 68 and no way she could have done it until she was 77.

And life expectancy from birth in the 1930s was skewed by much higher childhood mortality. People who survived to 65 even then could expect to live over a decade more, which was the majority of Americans (though a smaller majority then than now). As SSA charts indicate here:

 

[Huh?]

In my opinion, this is much of a math question as it is a policy question. I know so many people in their late 50's and 60's who have either involuntarily left the work force or are no longer able to work for health reasons. If you raise the retirement age, you are just pushing the problem to SSI.

I think the only practical solution is to raise the cap without raising benefits for those above the cap. We can get 75 years of grace by this one change.

 

[grimes70]

Agree with this and @Huh? . I have no issue with retiring IF you can do so, on your own, before social security benefits kick in, but the current retirement age for SS needs to be kept in line with life expectancy.

So how do people exist if they can neither physically do the work they have spent 40 years doing nor get because they are too old.

Let's have people whose income for tax purposes consists of over 50% invest income that should taxed at the usual rate for SS/Medicare. I believe there would then be adequate funds to fully fund those programs.

 

[Huh?]

Aside from social security, we have to recognize that we are going to spend more on health care as a society as we age. In 2023, we spent 18% of GDP on health care, and it's predicted (reasonably) to rise to 20% to 2032. Right now, 48% of US health care spending is paid by the government.

Those numbers are reasonable from a policy perspective, and we should endeavor to continue to have government fund that going forward through sufficient taxation. Our priorities should be how to improve quality outcomes within that spend - removing our over-reliance on fee for service, lifestyle including nutrition, preventive services and the like.

 

[altmin]

This would kill my mother.

Since my dad died we've been helping her contact companies and work through necessary changes. She wants to do everything like it's 1980. Phone calls, mail, checks, paper bills, etc.

She struggles to log onto the computer and check email.

Killing people's mothers is on the list to make government more efficient. Less old people = less expense.