The problem with social engineering is that the world constantly changes, but government programs don't.
Among other things, over the years, life spans have increased and families have shrunk. From 40 working Americans per retiree in 1935, we're down to a 3-1 ratio today.
As the ratio of workers to retirees has dwindled, adjustments were made to taxes and the retirement age to keep the system going. But it is impossible for bureaucrats to keep pace with a dynamic world. Only free markets can do that, which is why they work so well.
Estimates are that the current payroll tax will have to at least double to pay for upcoming generations. Our young people now entering the workforce could get twice the return on their money with just a bank CD.
The last attempt to "fix" Social Security was in 1983 with a special commission headed by Alan Greenspan. It supposedly was going to fix the system well into the 21st century. Within ten years it was clear that it didn't.
The Greenspan commission came up with the idea of raising even more funds from the payroll tax to build a trust fund to deal with the increasing number of retirees per worker.
The fund has been a joke because as the money went in, our government just spent it. So now it's just a pile of government IOU's. Now even that fund is almost in the red, ten years earlier than government economists were projecting just last year.
Other government conceived and managed dinosaurs, Medicare and Medicaid, are in even worse shape.
Re-invent America by bringing government management to our auto, banking, energy, and health care industries? If you ignore all past experience, you might like the idea.
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