So Huckabee has reason to be concerned about the number of wage-earners supporting Social Security.
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Bill Smith/AP File Lillie Steinhorn, 74, stands inside the computer tape storage room at the headquarters of the Social Security Administration in Baltimore in 1985. Retirement benefits are permanently reduced for early claiming. 8.
“Without it, I’d be on the street … panhandling”, Foerster says.
“So do we need to save Social Security?” You lose $1 in benefits for every $2 earned over $15,720 this year. Compared to today, therefore, there would be no cut.
What the Republicans hope to do is to use the Disability Insurance funding shortfall to re-open the debate on cutting Social Security. AARP helps people turn their goals and dreams into real possibilities, strengthens communities and fights for the issues that matter most to families such as healthcare, employment and income security, retirement planning, and protection from financial abuse.
But is it a good idea?
We understand the angst of those who do not want benefits cut or the eligibility age increased.
Social Security may be one of your largest assets. “The current system is a disgrace”, he says.
“The more time that they (members of Congress) take, the less acceptable the changes will be because there needs to be adequate time for the public to prepare and to adjust to whatever changes Congress will make”, Carolyn Colvin, acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, said in an interview. And that’s a losing proposition for us all. “We are continually working to improve the services we provide”. Salaries and wages make up 59 percent.
As Monday’s story notes, some relatively modest changes applied now could go a long way toward rescuing the program from insolvency, at least in the near term.
I know many people receiving their retirement and also getting their full Social Security benefit. Almost everyone else, however, faces an increasingly uncertain future. Two primary approaches are to raise taxes or to curb the amount of benefits for future Social Security recipients. The only question is whether to fight this fight now, which requires looking at both the politics and the alternatives. “Let’s do that and nothing more”. These views have fluctuated in recent decades, but the current level of doubt is similar to what Gallup first measured in 1989, when 47% said they would not be able to receive a benefit. Essentially there would be few surprises moving forward. As I noted above, this is a hard call. If that happens, it would trigger an automatic 19 percent cut in benefits.
Adding to the gridlock, policymakers are moving in opposite directions.
Typical boomers, however, didn’t have as many children as their parents did.
How could this be accomplished?
Medicare is solvent until 2030, unless Congress reduces benefits or increases payroll taxes. You can work together to calculate the various options and how much different permutations enable you both to collect.
Because you’d be starting from a higher base, your benefit would increase by $432 in such a year rather than $240.
As appealing as such proposals might be, they have two distinct problems.
These payments are vital to millions of people. “There is nothing you can do with saving and investing that would move the needle like working longer”. It was designed to prevent the elderly from falling into poverty and to provide supplemental retirement income.
It isn’t only for retirees like Foerster and others who have spent their work lives paying into the system.
The same logic applies today.
But there is an easy way for women to boost their income in later life. After all, the system is pretty straightforward: You contribute while you work, and after you retire you collect until you die.
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Believe in the importance of Social Security across political ideologies, generations: 66% say Social Security is one of the very most important government programs. None-the-less, taxes collected from those in the workforce will enable Social Security to cover roughly three-quarters of the benefits it expects to pay out. Even so, the need is pronounced, and it is immediate. “Most of the income in this country is made by people at the top who get dividends and capital gains”.
