Neighborhood Ministries

Now that we face the problem, we have to decide what to do about it. The Democrats feel we should tax the rich. That sounds good, they have lots of money. Income is taxed for Social Security at a certain percentage based on income  and there is currently a ceiling where income is no longer taxed. They propose to raise that limit so they can get more income, as well as raising taxes on income in general. The problem with raising the limit lies in the fact that very few make over the limit and those that do don’t make much over the limit. The amount raised would not be anywhere near enough to stabilize the fund. In addition, they want to raise benefits for Seniors which will further strain the fund, causing it to run out of funds even earlier than if nothing is done. While it sounds like they have good ideas to help, they are very short-sighted and the ideas only look good on paper. In fact, they will do more damage than good. It would result in the fund running out sooner than if nothing was done and hurt all those who depend on it. Republicans, on the other hand, are proposing to raise the age of retirement. That will hinder plans for those planning to retire at age 65, however many are healthy and could easily work another ten to twenty years, and it would not have to be very long. The last time they raised the age limit, they only raised it two years to age 67, but it bought us a lot more time because the most retirees are around age 65. The older people get, the more die so the number of retirees in the population declines as age increases. There are a lot of people aged 65 in the population but very few reach the age of 90 or 100. The result would be a lot more people working and fewer drawing benefits and the age increase would be so small, most people would not notice it. It would extend the fund and continue helping those who depend on it. For those who are not able to continue working until the new retirement age, there is Social Security  Disability which helps those who are currently not able to work until retirement age, so no one would really be hurt by it.