Way too many responses on this thread are knee-jerk “no.” When we talk about out-of-control spending, what the Hell do you think we’re talking about? One of the largest entitlement expenditures is benefits to seniors. How are we supposed to reduce the size of government without cutting spending on seniors? I don’t care what anyone on this thread says—today’s seniors did not pay for the benefits they are getting. And even if some did, why should some 20 year old making $10 per hour pay for a wealthy senior’s benefits? That is the very definition of generational theft.
We have been running a Ponzi scheme for years and now today’s seniors don’t want it to end because they’ll take a cut. Well, that just means young people will be totally screwed instead of just majorly screwed. The people who got the windfall are dead. You can’t dig them up and get the money back. Today’s seniors have to take a cut if we are going to restore sanity.
Now, that doesn’t mean that the ONLY cut is going to be cuts to benefits to wealthy seniors. It would have to be part of a comprehensive program to slash other social spending, slash government worker benefits and make other adjustments for non-wealthy seniors, like raising the retirement age to 70 or 71 before you get Social Security and Medicare.
The bottom line is that every single one of us has to take a cut in government spending to reduce government.
Further to my last post:
Oh, and by the way, I’m getting close to retirement and would take a pretty big hit if what I advocate goes through. But if it was part of a comprehensive package that was real and verifiable, I’d take the hit.
You are absolutely right.
But, that's not what Lindsey Graham is proposing. He is proposing that a subset of people deemed "unworthy" of Social Security benefits be denied.
And who is that subset? People who sacrificed their entire lives to invest and save in addition to their Social Security contributions.
When you have a proposal that spreads the sacrifice around to everyone, let's hear it. Otherwise, you are advocating nothing more than armed robbery, using the federal government as a weapon.