DEMOCRATIC SENATOR INTRODUCES BILL TO LIFT SOCIAL SECURITY’S TAX CAP, EXTEND ITS SOLVENCY FOR DECADES
Most of the proposed solutions to the shortfall involve cutting back benefits and raising the minimum retirement age. Both are deeply problematic.
This week, however, Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK) put forward a reform package that goes in the opposite direction, while still financially securing the program’s trust fund for roughly the next seven decades. The Washington Post’s Dylan Matthews laid out the details:
The Begich bill would lift the current payroll tax cap, which exempts wages in excess of a certain amount ($110,100 this year) from the tax. In turn, it would give high earners, who would pay more, additional benefits upon retirement, just as benefits increase as wages do for workers below the cap. […] IT ALSO INCREASES BENEFITS ACROSS-THE-BOARD (for everyone).
The Congressional Research Service ran the numbers back in 2010 and concluded that eliminating the payroll tax cap — while also paying out the new benefits to wealthier Americans in accordance with their new taxes — would eliminate 95 percent of the trust fund’s shortfall over the next 75 years.
hinkprogress.org/economy/2012/11/16/1208701/democratic-senator-introduces-bill-to-lift-social-securitys-tax-cap-extend-its-solvency-for-decades/?mobile=nc
Posted By: DAVID JOHNSON
Monday, November 19th 2012 at 3:05PM
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