Social Security Solution

We all hear about Social Security having problems and running out. We never hear of a solution. I will warn you this is going to be a long post, this is a big problem. This post, however, if followed in full by everyone in the country, would solve our social security woes (unless proven otherwise).

Where to start, this is big. We know its a problem and we know that nobody has a solution which works when keeping Social Security in existance. The problem that has brought the house of cards down: more old people than young people.

This can't be solved by killing old people, well, it could, but that just isn't nice. It is worse than nice: it is age genocide. We don't do that in this nation.

We could just print money to pay for it but that would lead (among our current spending) to hyperinflation.

So what should we do? I say we end the program.

Please stop running around like the end of the world is approaching. Hear my case before screaming about my evil heartless existence.

How do we end it? We could just stop paying now and witness our elderly bankrupt families who care enough to try and care for their elders, and see the elderly without caring families homeless in our streets and killing themselves to give mercy to their families wallets.

That isn't what I meant by end the program. We need to phase out the program in a way that new entries do not expect to receive the benefits but those who were promised those benefits receive them.

Hear that? Those who worked thinking they were going to get it will get it, those just starting won't get it.

Solution: an alternative.

Fact of life is you do not (if your lucky) work until the day you die. So having a place, an account, to put your money for retirement (still by government mandate) is the best option. An account where you pay the Social Security tax (possibly even Medicare, but that isn't the program I studied for this) and the cash builds up without having it pay for someone else, the government, or a bank's bad loans. An account which can only be increased until you retire and can only be touched by you.

Why this approach of a mandated approach to retirement? People just don't, en masse, plan for the future. Think of this: when you were 18 did you think of how you were going to pay the bills when you retired? People really don't think about saving. This account would allow that, but there is a catch.

All those people who were promised their retirement will still get it. How will we pay for it? Well, everyone will still pay the Social Security tax. Yes, a double dose of taxes for people. It is a very painful thing I know, but hey, such a problem requires some unsavory solutions. You have a better solution, let me know.

This will allow the funds to be raised to pay for social security without (long term) leading to the unending bankruptcy of the nation.

Four paragraphs and things sound pretty sound, but wait, there is more. The fund can not stop raising (as in collecting, not increasing) the Social Security double tax (double in the sense that it goes to two places) until the last person receiving benefits has, well, stopped receiving those benefits. This means having a shift of Social Security to just handling retirement accounts, and allowing and creating other programs for disabilities and other things.

When a person with the account dies, the funds should go to declared beneficiaries. Will you get all the funds when a person dies? No, the government will never let go of that inheritance tax. So basically, when a person dies, half of the funds in their account will go to the heir, and half to the government. This way the government still gets it's cut to pay for managing the accounts.

The agency could be called the Retirement Account Agency, and a requirement of a yearly audit would ensure proper handling of the finances.

Now the rate someone withdraws their retirement should be left up to them. I would personally recommend people prepare to live for 100 years. Odds are you probably won't live 100 years, but planning that far ahead will give you some breathing room to give a helpful boost to your beneficiaries for funeral costs and other purposes.

You got a better idea? Let me hear about it. Think my plan won't work, let me know why.