Ratio of Social Security benefits to Social Security taxes paid, by race or ethnicity and year.
Does Social Security need to be fixed? As Democrats and Republicans grapple over how to reduce the government’s budget deficit in the face of rising costs for pensions and health care, whether Social Security should be touched remains one of the most controversial topics in American budgetary politics. But something big is missing to the debate over the finances of what is still the largest component of the social safety net: an understanding of how well it does its job. When you peek under the hood, it doesn’t always look so great. Indeed, this supposedly great redistributive program — which uses a broad tax on all workers to protect the elderly from poverty — exhibits some fairly stark regressive features. One well-known regressive feature comes from the rule that benefits must be annuitized, paid out over time in monthly installments rather than as a lump sum. This means that richer people who tend to live longer will get a bigger benefit than poorer people with shorter life spans. Survivor benefits redistribute money from the singles — who don’t get the benefit — to the married, who do. Eugene Steuerle, Karen Smith and Caleb Quakenbush of the Urban Institute in Washington just discovered another unsuspected regressive... |
...the 60 Minutes segment focused on some fraud in the program in one impoverished area of the country in order to paint disability recipients generally as the undeserving poor, slackers and frauds.
There is a mistaken notion floating around out there that a person can just waltz into Social Security, claim to be disabled, and voila—he’s granted benefits!There is a mistaken notion floating around out there that a person can just waltz into Social Security, claim to be disabled, and voila—he’s granted benefits! Nothing could be further from the truth. The burden of proof is on the claimant (the person claiming benefits) to show that he or she is disabled from engaging in substantial gainful activity (SGA) for a period of at least 12 continuous months. More about SGA in a bit. That proof starts with medical records, and diagnoses made by doctors. Self-diagnosing just doesn’t cut it, even if you’ve read up on your condition all over the internet, and you’re absolutely positive you know what’s wrong with you! Sometimes we get calls from people who do not have health insurance, and even though they have a serious medical condition, they have been unable to access much in the way of health care. Sadly, some of those folks who should be able to qualify for benefits do not, because they simply do not have the necessary treatment records to document the seriousness of their conditions.
While a Washington State law went into effect this weekend barring employers from requesting access to Facebook passwords, if your privacy settings are not tight, curious parties can randomly obtain information about you.
