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Social Security Essay

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Title of Paper : Social Security

Social security, created in 1935, is the most costly item in the federal budget. The program provides old age, survivors’ and disability insurance to a healthy portion of Americans. Workers and their employers fund the system by each paying payroll taxes. The Internal Revenue Service collects the taxes and deposits the money in government-administrated accounts known as the Old Age and Survivors and Disability Insurance Trust Funds(OASDI). The payroll tax revenues are used to pay benefits to those people currently collecting Social Security pensions. Social Security taxes also pay for Medicare, the national health program for the elderly.

The huge problem with the current situation facing Social …show more content…

Republican appropriators have been trying every fiscal trick

in their book, plus some previously unseen, as they attempt to pass the

13 fiscal year 2000 appropriations bills without touching the part of

the surplus generated by Social Security, which is currently taking in

more in taxes than it pays out in benefits(www.socialsecurity.com).

The author of this paper cannot see any rhyme or reason to this argument. Facts about the future, although not concrete due to birth and death rates, provide a high percentage estimation of how population growth will affect Social Security. To disregard certain evidence is preposterous at best. This argument about past history holds some water, but has many errors. The future cannot be gauged solely upon inductive thinking.

Thoughts of the retirements age being raised is a strong case to be made. The age has been raised before, so raising the bar is nothing new.

In 1983, the National Commission on Social Security Reform, headed by current Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan, raised the retirement age as part of a package of reforms designed to save the system. The retirement age will increase in stages from 65 to 67 by 2022, while the early retirement age remains at 62. However, workers who opt out early only get 70 percent of the full Social Security benefit.

Many of the plans to overhaul Social Security

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