The only possible silver lining I see in any of this is that the system(s) will go broke. And then (maybe) America will say "Any politician who promises to use taxpayer funds to solve problems in my life is lying."
Government budgets should cover defense, courts, some transportation infrastructurre, and not much else. The budget should be far less than 50% of its current size -- if we go broke enough, maybe people will understand that.
It will never go broke because fed can create money and the public will not get upset about spending. I would like voters/taxpayers to understand what this program is, redistribution. Democrats want them to think it is a retirement program that they ‘earned’.
Back when Reagan cut the deal in 1980s with democrats it was a crime. To generate a off budget surplus to spend while telling public it was a self funding retirement program with a trust fund. I would NEVER support a tax increase in SS for this reason.
It sounded like GWB was willing to sign a bill raising the FICA tax-CAP on SS for savings accounts (will never know for sure fortunately)