We have moved the retirement age back (for me it is 67 years old); between that and ignoring inflation they will save a lot of money.
I understand there is opportunity for those who want it; with our urban populations the problems run much deeper. Too many are a semi-literate population without any work ethic at all; they have never seen a breadwinner provide for a family (for several generations at this point). They’ve been reduced to such a low state by the culture of dependency that they are extremely difficult to motivate; the best most hope for is a token position with no expectations.
If you are less than 55 your SS retirement age is 67 for “full Retirement” which means little. “Full retirement” is just a marketing mechanism for the date they wish you to retire. You could retire at 62 or 70 or anywhere in between. But SS is hardly retirement for most. Its a minimum wage to help prevent elder poverty. To adjust SS they need to move the range, which has been in place for 30 years, back to 63 to 71. Even moving it to 62.5 to 70.5 would put the SS system in balance. Its not far off now.
The real issue is government worker pensions. Federal workers can retire at 50. And many States have workers that can retire in their 50’s as well. California and Illinois are going to follow Detroit down the rabbit hole of pension debt. Besides medical benefits, its really government pensions, even at the federal level, that are making our debt grow out of control. Moving back their retirement age to somewhere around 65 would solve a lot of problems. That is a lot of productive tax paying hours to offset retirees. America would not have to import labour. We have it now. We just need to make these people work as long as the rest of us.
Also, if the economists calculated wealth by including a pension as a valued asset (like an annuity is), you would find that our wealth disparity is nowhere near what they are saying. Almost all full government retirees are millionaires.