Our problem is insufficient government money

Reader comment on: Ryan's Medicare Means Test

Submitted by KT (United States), Nov 10, 2011 14:34

The problems is that there is that there will never be enough money to pay everyone benefits equally unless taxes on young people are raised to astronomical levels. Since young people are poorer as a group than older people, it seems unfair and stupid to me to strap them with sky-high taxes when they will NEVER, EVER see similar benefits (because of falling birth rates and economic changes in the world). Taxing "the rich" at astronomical levels will lead to fewer rich people, and it wouldn't make much of a dent in debt anyway.

Means-testing Medicare and Social Security is not fair, but at least it encourages more independence from government than high tax/high benefit schemes. It treats Social Security and Medicare more like they should have been treated in the first place - as safety nets. (if you think that they should have been enacted at the federal level in the first place).

While we're at it, we might think about means-testing unsustainable government pensions. Many government workers don't have to pay into Social Security, and their benefits are generally much higher than those in the private sector. Pensions for members of Congress, the administration and other top people in government are way out of line. Many government workers at lower levels also have extremely generous retirements and other benefits.

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