We all know Social Security needs major overhaul to be a
valid resource for retired Americans going forward. It is an ongoing headline
in the news.
Republicans tend to suggest one solution or part of the
solution is to raise the retirement age.
Nowadays people worry about job reductions overall in
society due to AI replacing so many workers.
So shouldn’t we look at lowering the retirement age.
Why?
This allows gainful employment for workers in the prime
years and protects the job market from being over saturated with the reduction
in the labor force due to AI.
And how? And this how is just another reason our societal
mindset needs to change. This isn’t socialism or just tax the rich to tax the
rich, but to level out the long term playing field and allow people who create
jobs etc to continue to do so, while allowing our society to continue to
prosper overall and have even just a basic quality of life.
First and it is just a reality corporations and businesses
need to accept. Wages need to increase. If people are making billions on top of
billions the workers wages can increase. It is just common sense for a better
society.
Second the social security top tax limits need to be
eliminated and all tax brackets need to have social security contributions. You
can say after a certain level you start reducing the rate or percentage being
used. For example raise the full taxable limit to $250,000 or $300,000. ( and
depending on a few factors we may not increase the employer’s responsibility
past a certain amount or eliminate it entirely for small and mid size businesses,
but then you are getting into how do you determine small and mid size
companies, something to be worked out in
the details) I stole some of this idea from a letter to an editor and that
person said regressive tax. I am not sure if that is the right definition yet
generally you lower the percentage withdrawn up to a certain income level. So
by let’s say $750,000 or $1,000,000 the percentage withdrawn is 1 or 2% and
then is zero above that. Again the exact figures get worked out in the details.
Third you lower the potential age you can start taking
social security. If people have done well and they want to do something
different in life or even start their own business they would be young enough
say 60 to start receiving benefits. You could keep the benefit amount on a
similar sliding scale where you start at 60 with a percentage of full benefits then
at a later age you receive your full benefits. And we even lower this to 65
maybe. And possibly if more are paying in, benefits might increase also. Again this
is worked out in the details.
The biggest issue that needs addressing is most people that
rely on social security are in service industry jobs or similar which historically
have been on the low end of the totem pole. This is why the overall corporate
pay rate needs to increase. More people paid higher allows them to save more,
allows them to have more flexibility in their retirement and both the higher
wage earners and corporations contribute to the overall health of society by
allowing lower wage workers a basic decent end of their life opportunity. This
is not socialism. This is society overall respecting the dignity of life.
The goal is not to say we cannot have rich people or AI, but
to shift some of the responsibility of protecting their workers onto them and
not just on the government protecting a workforce that is stretched to their
limits under paid with no quality of life. Even rich people like going out to
eat or whatever. They just need to respect the people that are there serving
them and not treat them as serfs.
Or the people with excessive billions can be hated and
eventually pitchfork economics come into play and that doesn’t do anyone any
good.
And yes this is I don’t know how many ideas or variations of
a theme (including my last post) I have to actually make social security work now
and in the future.
Cheers
