Free Republic

When House Speaker John Boehner calls for trillions of dollars of spending cuts, the message is clear. Any deal to raise the federal debt ceiling must include significant savings in Social Security and Medicare benefits. Subsidizing the elderly is the biggest piece of federal spending (more than two-fifths of the total), but trimming benefits for well-off seniors isn't just budget arithmetic. It's also the right thing to do. I have been urging higher eligibility ages and more means-testing for Social Security and Medicare for so long that I forget that many Americans still accept the outdated and propagandistic notion that...

It’s time for a 21st-century retirement age. If 40 is the new 20 and 50 is the new 30, why shouldn’t 70 be the new 65? The last time politicians tinkered ever so gingerly with the government-sanctioned retirement age, Ronald Reagan was in office and Generation X–ers were all in diapers. Since then, American life expectancy has increased by half a decade and continues to rise — while the “traditional” retirement age (established eight decades ago) has only recently begun phasing up to 67 and the official “early” retirement age (established four decades ago) remains stuck at 62. There is...

Schumer steps up Social Security assault on House RepublicansBy Alexander Bolton - 01/27/11 07:28 PM ET Senate Democrats led by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) are gearing up for a battle with House Republicans over Medicare and Social Security benefits. Schumer and other Democratic strategists see Medicare and Social Security as winning political issues that can help them regain the momentum they lost over the last two years. Schumer, who has taken over the Senate Democrats' communications operation, delivered some of his most direct shots at House GOP leaders. “They want to privatize Social Security,” Schumer...

U.S. Social Security Will Go Bankrupt In 2010 Economics / US Debt Dec 08, 2009 - 03:16 AM By: Gary North For the third time in my life, the Social Security System will go belly-up. The first time was in 1977 – well, almost. To head off the bust, Jimmy Carter got Congress to pass a major FICA tax increase – sorry, "contribution" increase – in order to save Social Security. The rate would be hiked in phases from 2% to 6.15% (times two: employee and employer). He promised: "Now this legislation will guarantee that from 1980 to the year...

House Democrats Contemplate Abolishing 401(k) Tax Breaks Powerful House Democrats are eyeing proposals to overhaul the nation’s $3 trillion 401(k) system, including the elimination of most of the $80 billion in annual tax breaks that 401(k) investors receive. House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-California, and Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Washington, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, are looking at redirecting those tax breaks to a new system of guaranteed retirement accounts to which all workers would be obliged to contribute. A plan by Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic-policy analysis...

It is rare that the Left-wing leaning Fact Check.org find an Obama claim so egregious that even they have to criticize it. The Senator's recent Social Security claims were THAT BAD so even Fact Check couldn't ignore it. Senator Obama is taking advantage of both Old Ladies and the current Economic Crisis by warning seniors that if McCain had his way, their Social Security money would now be in the stock market and they would have lost half their retirement money. Obama said that "if my opponent had his way, the millions of Floridians who rely on it would've had...

WASHINGTON — New legislation on Capitol Hill seeks to curb an increasingly popular mortgage concept: providing home loans to applicants using an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number in lieu of a Social Security number. ITINs are issued by the Internal Revenue Service to assist immigrant workers who do not qualify for a Social Security number to report their income and pay federal taxes. Dozens of banks around the country have begun offering home mortgages to undocumented immigrants using ITINs, but their programs generally have been low-key and small in volume. Bank of America provoked a controversy recently when it announced a...

Social Security was supposed to be a killer issue for Democrats... But suddenly the tables are turning on several Democratic candidates because of their endorsement of the tax-increase agenda of the ...AARP. The liberal entitlement lobby has asked candidates around the country to fill out a questionnaire asking, "Will you support a balanced Social Security plan to continue the program's guaranteed benefits for future generations?" That may sound innocuous, but here's how AARP defines its balanced plan on its Web site... "AARP believes that a bipartisan plan that balances additional contributions from high income workers with modest adjustments in future...

Despite being a hot topic among certainly campaigning politicians, many less-political Americans, especially younger Americans, consider Social Security to be a boring, worthless issue that they don't need to care about. Here are eight reasons why that's wrong, and why everyone, especially the young, really should consider Social Security an important issue in their lives.

One Culture, Indivisible By Herman CainNew York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said of illegal aliens last week at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, "Although they broke the law by illegally crossing our borders…our city's economy would be a shell of itself had they not, and it would collapse if they were deported. The same holds true of the nation." Bloomberg and other elected officials who value the economic impact of illegal aliens' labor over the cultural decimation wrought by our acquiescence to illegals' demands should be swiftly removed from office. Those we elect to make laws must not be allowed...

Misplaced Priorities Again in the Senate By Herman CainIt could cost more to get caught working in the world's oldest profession if a bill passed last week by the U.S. Senate Finance Committee becomes law. The Finance Committee approved legislation that would allow the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to prosecute pimps and prostitutes for tax code violations. Senate Finance Committee chairman Charles Grassley (R-IA) proposed the legislation, which would impose a 10-year prison term on pimps for each prostitute in his employ on whom he fails to file a W-2 form. What's next? Will the Senate Finance Committee require pimps...

We Need a New Independence By Herman Cain "That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." When our Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence, they envisioned a governing body comprised of citizen legislators who served at the consent of the public. Today, too many of our elected officials have become independent kings concerned more with power, party and their political careers. The people who elect them and common sense policy solutions are no longer priorities. The inability of the men and women who represent us to secure...

Democrats' New Direction: Same as the Old Direction By Herman CainHouse and Senate Democratic leaders held a press conference on June 16 to announce their bold, new policy initiatives in a plan called New Direction. Their accompanying press statement promises, "Democrats are ready with a New Direction, with policies to address the real challenges Americans face every day." Their idea of the "real challenges Americans face every day" does not include fighting and winning the global war on terrorism, restructuring the Social Security and Medicare programs, rewriting the income tax code or cutting federal spending, because none of those issues...

It’s Time To Go RINO Hunting By Herman Cain June 7, 2006 The split in the majority party between conservatives and RINOs – Republicans in Name Only – first became apparent during last year’s debate over proposals to restructure the Social Security program. The chasm has only deepened this session in debates and votes in Congress on immigration, tax policy, spending and judicial nominees. Whether we agree or not with all aspects of President Bush’s agenda, we at least know his positions. Conversely, Congressional Republicans are like a lost ship adrift at sea with no captain or compass. President Bush’s...

We Need More Big Potatoes By Herman CainMy grandfather was a farmer. Though he was the grandson of slaves, he was able to own his small farm in rural Douglas County, Georgia and earn a modest return as the fruits of his labor. Many times as a little boy when I would visit my grandparents, Granddad had to take a load of potatoes into the local farmer's market. When he finished loading the wagon Granddad would announce to all the grandchildren running around in the yard, "Them that's goin', get on the wagon! Them that ain't, get outta the way!"...

Social Security Scam Keeps On Ticking May 17, 2006 By Herman Cain The Social Security Trustees issued their annual report earlier this month, and the program's fiscal outlook is even worse than estimated last year. Yet, as predictably as May brings rain showers from Heaven and bloated supplemental spending bills from Congress, liberals in the media, the House and the Senate continue to deny that the Social Security program faces a fiscal crisis. The 2006 Social Security Trustees Report found that the estimated year in which the program will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll tax...

O.K. Freepers, here’s the list of Pubbies who voted with the Dems Thursday to give Social Security benefits to Illegal Aliens. Brownback (KS) Chafee (RI) DeWine (OH) Graham (SC) Hagel (NE) Lugar (IN) Martinez (FL) McCain (AZ) Specter (PA) Stevens (AK) Voinovich (OH) I must admit that I was shocked by Brownback’s and Lugar’s votes.

PHILADELPHIA - (KRT) - On Thursday night, President Bush announced that he'd like to balance Social Security's books by having retirement benefits grow more slowly for the better-off than for people with lower incomes. He was endorsing, at least in principle, an idea called "progressive indexing," the brainchild of a Boston-based investment executive named Robert C. Pozen. And progressive indexing, if enacted, would have a dramatic impact on the vast majority of working Americans. In the decades to come, only the poorest 30 percent of retirees would receive the Social Security benefits they're promised under current law. Everyone else would...