Creativity is good even in public policy

 

As you know I complain much about the fact Republicans and Democrats never really have any answers and no longer solve our nation’s problems. And if you read this blog regularly you know occasionally I make stabs at trying to come up with new ideas for public policy.

And today I read an article that is a letter to the Editor of the Los Angeles Times that is an idea to help Social Security long term.

This to me shows that people do care and are thinking more than our Congress. And improving Social Security should be a priority for our Congress. Social Security is a monstrosity when it comes to projecting out numbers, yet the idea in the article is creative and looks implementable. It is not a stretch to understand. The real trick would be to apply it going forward in some mock ups and if viable it should be considered by Congress.

And if it doesn’t completely address the revenue problem but is close we should then look at other options to enhance.  All in all there are answers out there, it is just a shame the people who are paid to represent us, cannot even begin to solve the problems facing our country.

And for your benefit here is a quick recap. The author of the letter called it a regressive tax, personally I am not sure the verbiage works, but here goes.

The author suggests instead of eliminating the cap on taxing wages for social security, create the regressive tax where the first $200,000 is taxed at 6% (currently at 6.2 for first 184,000) then drop to 5% for 200k to 300k, 4 for the next hundred thousand until you get to $600,000 and is one percent for everyone above this threshold. Again this is a quick recap so I hope I spelled it out correctly. The author states this could be palatable politically and I tend to agree and I guess obviously since I am posting it. 😊

I always say center right ideas work the best and probably are the best answers politically. I hope this spurs some creativity or an open mind on your part to think of bettering this idea if needed or for other issues facing our country.

And let’s thank the author for thinking of rational solutions to our country’s issues. Unfortunately our current government isn’t doing it.

So again I say we need new parties and new leadership and answers like this show why.

 

Cheers