Lawmakers are considering raising the retirement age to 69 as a partial solution to the Social Security conundrum. Given that the benefit coincided with the average life expectancy (age 62) when the program began, I see this as a step in the right direction.
There will be critics on the left, and they’ll accuse those of us who don’t consider the program sacrosanct to not care for aging blue collar labor or the working poor. We should be as happy for the mandated redistribution of income as socialists they are. However, there is a principle that disproves the brilliance of social security when the program is compared to the alternatives, some of which are currently in use by organized labor and government pension programs. That principle is known as the "laws of math."
J. Philip Faranda
Leave a Reply