To ensure retirement security, let's start by expanding Social Security.NHUnionLeader

[elleng]

by Martin O'Malley

Nearly a century ago, during the depths of the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt joined forces with John Winant, New Hampshire’s Republican governor, to establish Social Security.

With Gov. Winant acting as the program’s first chairman, they sought to deliver President Roosevelt’s promise that — after a life of hard labor — no elderly American should be forced to languish in poverty.

Today in America, we have lost sight of this goal. The fallout from the financial crisis and the legacy of trickle-down economics has cut deeply into public pensions and families’ retirement savings. We are facing a national retirement crisis, as nearly one in three Americans — and more than one in two under the age of 30 — now has no retirement savings at all.

This is not our American Dream. As a nation, we must act to ensure the retirement security of American families. And we should start by expanding Social Security benefits — not cutting them or merely “enhancing them” — to provide a foundation for a more secure retirement to all those who have worked hard to achieve it. >>>

http://www.unionleader.com/article/20150825/OPINION02/150829657/1068/news0606

[SheilaT]

1. Yep.

Even though Social Security was always intended to be one leg of a three legged stool (the others being a pension and savings) the sad truth is there are not many more pensions out there, and personal savings rates are abysmally low.

Some here have even advocated lowering the age to collect SS to 50, which I honestly think is far, far too low. It's one thing to be on disability, no longer able to work. But for most people, there really are jobs out there, and you're better off working, even at a reduced rate, and not taking SS.

The other thing to consider is what kind of reduction would need to be in effect to take SS at 50. I'm guessing in the neighborhood of 80-90%, meaning you'd collect at age 50 only 10-20% of what you'd get at full retirement age. Not very much money. Plus, full retirement age is the point at which you can earn as much money as you can with no reduction in SS. Before that age, income over some particular amount results in SS reduction.

People honestly do need to save more.

[JDPriestly]

2. Problem is, people can't save more. They are not well enough paid, and employers have this

habit of firing people when they get in their 50s and early 60s right before retirement age.

We need to increase Social Security in every way.

[SheilaT]

3. Back before there was Social Security,

people did save on vastly smaller incomes than today. Often people lived with their children or grandchildren in old age. I see so many people who are underwater on their car loan, who have a home larger than they really need, saying with much pathos how they cannot possibly save. Yes, I understand that wages have been stagnant, but living below one's means has always been a good strategy.

Increasing SS can only go so far. And as I pointed out, the lower the age you can collect, the smaller the amount you'll get.