Posted on 06/29/2010 8:23:18 AM PDT by Sub-Driver
Top Republican: Raise Social Security's retirement age to 70 By Michael O'Brien - 06/29/10 10:50 AM ET
A Republican-held Congress might look to raise the retirement age to 70, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) suggested Monday.
Boehner, the top Republican lawmaker in the House, said that raising the retirement age by five year, indexing benefits to the rate of inflation and means-testing benefits would make the massive entitlement program more solvent.
"We're all living a lot longer than anyone ever expected," Boehner said in a meeting with the editors of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. "And I think that raising the retirement age -- going out 20 years, so you're not affecting anyone close to retirement -- and eventually getting the retirement age to 70 is a step that needs to be taken."
The GOP leader said that Social Security was the most important entitlement to reform, though he also pledged that Republicans would bring legislation to the floor to repeal and replace the healthcare reforms passed earlier this year if the GOP wins back control of the House this fall.
But Boehner also floated several other reforms to Social Security, paired with raising the retirement age, to make it more solvent. Boehner said that benefits should be tied to increases in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) instead of wage inflation, and he suggested reducing or eliminating benefits to Americans with a "substantial non-Social Security income" while retired.
"We just need to be honest with people," he said. "I'm not suggesting it's going to be easy, but I think if we did those three things, you'd pretty well solve the problem."
Republican have made cutting spending and reforming entitlement programs a key part of their 2010 campaign message.
Watch the entirety of Boehner's explanation below:
Rot in hell, Boehner!
Just like a scumbag politician who doesn’t need the money to say crap like this.
I’ve been working and paying into this siphon since 1964, cannot collect full benefits until I’m 67, now he wants to make it 70?.
If I had all of the money that’s been stolen from me for the past 46 years, I could retire now.
Rot in hell, Boehner!
Then when people started living longer, it became a VOTING BLOCK
I feel no sympathy for oldsters who voted themselves their grandchildrens' money
Hey! Why don't we just LOAN OURSELVES $10 trillion dollars- payable in the year 3000 (let THEM worry about it)
If we’re going to keep this ridiculous system, and it appears that we are, then it needs to be done. (Says one who is finally getting to draw his after paying in for over40 years.)
You are welcome to be all for it. I am not.
Forget fixing it. END IT!!!
OTOH, the average life expectancy of black males is about 65. Thats a whole swath of people looking to get "theirs" through the back door.
Why not end Welfare and other entitlements first?
Raise it to 100, then only a few will collect benefits.
I so agree!
The bureaucracy alone would save billions.
If we got rid of all the alphabet agencies in DC there would then be enough workers available, that not one illegal alien would have a job.
He's got his government lottery style retirement benefits...
You on the other hand, can eat dirt.
I have to agree here. I’ve just found a position after being laid off at 53. Took me 4 months. At least I’m not having as “would you like fries with that....yet!”
The problem with SS (interesting abbreviation noted..) is as you say. It is a giant Ponzi scheme. If it were set up as a savings plan instead AND the government stopped raiding it continually, then it would be solvent by definition.
Then we have the discussion of whether the government is a good investor - wouldn’t be nice to at least be in territory where that was the problem set instead of the bankruptcy the system is currently staring at.
This is all Boehner can come up with given all Washington's dramatic increases in spending first under him, then Pelosi? Screwing us again(where's the trust fund? Gone!) to pay for Obama's spending? Don't worry, Congress and federal employees pensions are secured. Why don't they have to work and pay taxes till 70? Here's to all the freepers that have been posting that Republicans would save us.
I think Boehner was exempting those close to retirement from his proposed change in the age to receive benefits.
How about 80? Or 90? The point is to make sure as few collect SS as possible, isn’t it?
well, we could just get rid of all of Obozocare except the death panels
did we have to bring this up before the 2010 elections?
Exactly. When something unpleasant must be done, you figure out how to make the other side take the blame. Politics 101.
Boehner failed to mention privitization, which is the real solution. Perpetuating this Ponzi scheme should be a non-starter.
3 generations ago life expectancy for a male was 53.6 years.
Coincedently that was the retirement age.
Yet they allow government workers to retire after twenty years of driving buses in Boston, at age 55 for cops, teachers, and a slew of others, and they retire bureaucrats only to rehire them full time. And, these bastards do not pay into Social Security. They will want our retirement savings taxed to support their government elite pensions. Its a racket. The mob moved from the streets to the govenment.
Yeah, you career politicians live a lot longer today. Best healthcare in the world at no cost, incredible work schedule, perks up the yin yang, a ridiculous retirement wage that you never put a penny of your own money into and no physical labor. Yeah...raise the age to 85...or pass a law that says no one can retire at all. FU
FMCDH(BITS)
Yet they allow government workers to retire after twenty years of driving buses in Boston, at age 55 for cops, teachers, and a slew of others, and they retire bureaucrats only to rehire them full time. And, these bastards do not pay into Social Security. They will want our retirement savings taxed to support their government elite pensions. Its a racket. The mob moved from the streets to the govenment.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.