- Messages
- 2,177
Exactly. Thus is the same philosophy that requires government photo ID for voting while shutting down DMV offices.
Battle over Mandatory (aka “Entitlement”) Spending
- Thread starter nycfan
- Start date
- Replies: 163
- Views: 2K
- Politics
- Messages
- 3,780
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
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 2,333
"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
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 2,333
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
Honored Member
- Messages
- 995
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
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 2,333
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.
- Messages
- 15,306
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.
- Messages
- 1,064
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
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 2,333
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.
Paine
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 1,718
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.
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.
Yep.
- Messages
- 1,046
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.
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.
Last edited:
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.
- Messages
- 1,046
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.
Paine
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 1,718
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.”
Paine
Iconic Member
- Messages
- 1,718
Yes, I agree. That’s why I included the point about principle. I think a dignified retirement is a human right. Social security is failing to provide the bare necessities as it was designed to due to income inequality.
I don’t think social security should be expanded to the point that it can fund lavish travel for retired people, that’s not the point of the system. I was making a broader point about retirement and the elimination of many defined benefit pension plans. Someone’s ability to have a good retirement shouldn’t depend on their stock market luck.
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.
- Messages
- 15,306
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:
