Jeb Bush: Social Security Means-Testing 'Ought to Be Considered'

CNS News ^ | June 1, 2015 | Susan Jones

[BradtotheBone]

(CNSNews.com) - Jeb Bush says he would considering pushing back the Social Security retirement age by as many as five years and scaling back benefits for Americans who paid into the system but who also have accumulated wealth.

"We need to look over the horizon and begin to phase in, over an extended period of time, going from (age) 65 to 68 or 70. And that by itself will help sustain the retirement system for anybody under the age of 40," Bush, a potential contender for the Republican presidential nomination, told CBS's "Face the Nation" on Sunday.

Bush also wants to phase out benefits for higher earners, who have paid into the system for their entire working lives.

"What about means testing?" Bob Schieffer asked Bush.

"I think it ought to be considered, for sure," Bush replied.

As conceived by the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Social Security was intended to be a retirement insurance program for all working Americans regardless of income, funded by mandatory payroll taxes.

Means-testing would turn Social Security into a wealth transfer program, diverting payroll contributions from those who earn more to those who earn less.

And if Jeb Bush has his way on immigration, some of those lower-income workers would be people who came to the United States illegally.

[crusher2013]

Not to mention that the dollars you paid in the past were worth a lot more than today’s dollars.

[dragnet2]

You want me to take a $200,000 "haircut"? Bullshit.

No sh*t ditto. But don't owe government, as they'll come after you with punitive vengeance, interest, fines and worse. It's pay up or else.

Brought to us by the same government in D.C. who spend more tax dollars on tens of millions of illegals than what is spent on our veterans.

I feel for those in their 20s, early 30s today. They all better get good paying jobs and never spend any of it.

[tdscpa]

Are you sure of your numbers? You are 80 years old, have been paying maximum FICA every year since you were 14 years old in 1949? Wow!

[C. Edmund Wright]

I agree with the multiple government pension thing - and disability as well. You’re correct.

However, a gradual and slow raising of the age simply is not, as you put it, “asking more of our young people” - besides, it’s reasonable, logical and necessary.

[HomerBohn]

I didn’t pay the maximum until I reached age 29.

[Will88]

The problem with raising the Social Security age is that you assume that there w/b jobs for people in their 60’s-70’s.

There seem to be questions of whether there will be sufficient jobs for people of all ages, including recent college graduates.

But any changes to the SS eligibility age should be done 25 or so years in advance so there would be many years to plan for it by those affected. And many work beyond ages 62 and 65 now.

It's pretty dumb to have never adjusted the eligibility ages for a program started before WWII. And the adjustments would probably come only about once in a generation, if that often.