Social Security reaches an important milestone in August of this year. The Social Security Administration is celebrating 80 years of “public service” with a tree-planting ceremony at the agency’s headquarters in Baltimore, a public-policy discussion in Washington, D.C., and activities at sporting events across the country.
The Social Security Administration is celebrating 80 years of socialism.
With little opposition, bills to establish the Social Security system were passed by the U.S. House and Senate in April and June of 1935. After acceptance of the final conference report by both houses of Congress, a bill (H.R.7260) was sent to Franklin Roosevelt on August 9, 1935. It was an Act
to provide for the general welfare by establishing a system of Federal old-age benefits, and by enabling the several States to make more adequate provision for aged persons, blind persons, dependent and crippled children, maternal and child welfare, public health, and the administration of their unemployment compensation laws; to establish a Social Security Board; to raise revenue; and for other purposes.
The Social Security Act was signed into law (PL 74-271) by the president at approximately 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday, August 14, 1935.
In 1936, the U.S. Postal Service distributed applications for Social Security account numbers to those who worked or expected to work in jobs covered by Social Security. In 1937, workers began to acquire credits toward benefits and employers and employees began paying Social Security taxes. In 1939, the Social Security program was broadened to include dependents and survivors’ benefits. In 1940, the Social Security Trust Fund was established as a separate account in the U.S. Treasury and monthly benefits first became payable. On January 31, 1940, Ida May Fuller, became the first person to receive a Social Security check. Her first check was for $22.54. She had paid into the system between 1937 and 1939 a total of $24.75. By the time she died at age 100 in 1975, she had received a total of $22,888.92 in benefits.
Social Security now provides benefits for retirement, disability, survivorship, and death to more than 63 million Americans at a cost of more than $850 billion a year. Social Security is “funded” by pay-roll tax deductions from both employers and employees. Although the tax rate was originally 2 percent (split between employers and employees) on a taxable wage base of $3,000, by 1990 the rate had increased to 12.4 percent with a wage base of $51,300. Except during 2011 and 2012, when the employee share of Social Security taxes was lowered from 6.2 to 4.2 percent, the tax rate has remained the same. However, the taxable wage base increased to $118,500 beginning in 2015. Benefits were also increased in 2015, thanks to a Cost-of-Living Adjustment (COLA) of 1.7 percent. The maximum benefit for a worker retiring at full retirement age is now $2,663 a month. The original retirement age to receive full benefits was 65, but for those born after 1937, the age has been gradually increased. For those born after 1960, it is now 67, with reduced benefits available for those at least 62 who wish to begin receiving benefits.
Opponents of the Social Security Act labeled it socialism and Roosevelt a socialist. Now, eighty years later, the very conservatives who call Barack Obama a socialist are some of the strongest defenders of Social Security. Like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.): “I’m encouraged by any steps that President Obama is taking to save and preserve Social Security and Medicare. I think it should be a bipartisan priority to strengthen Social Security and Medicare to preserve the benefits for existing seniors and to enact fundamental reform to ensure that those programs remain strong and vital for generations to come.” In their “Pledge to America,” House Republicans vowed to “protect our entitlement programs for today’s seniors and future generations.”
Republican politicians and conservative think tanks are always coming up with plans to reform, strengthen, or save Social Security. The latest such plan is that offered by New Jersey governor and Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie. His plan, which will not affect current retirees, will be phased in gradually. He proposes to cut benefits for future retirees with incomes over $80,000, eliminate benefits for future retirees with incomes over $200,000, raise the normal retirement age to 69, increase the early retirement age to 64, eliminate the payroll tax on seniors who choose to keep working past age 62, and provide a one-time 5 percent increase in monthly benefits to all beneficiaries when they reach the age of 85.
Other reform provisions over the years have included increasing or eliminating the payroll-tax cap, means-testing benefits, increasing the tax rate, recalculating or eliminating COLAs, fully taxing benefits, ending early-retirement benefits, reducing benefits across the board, and privatizing the system.
But just what is it that the Republicans and conservatives are wanting to reform?
Republicans and conservatives want to reform a program that is blatantly unconstitutional.
Republicans and conservatives want to continue a program that is fundamentally socialistic.
Republicans and conservatives want to safeguard a program that is a relic of Roosevelt’s New Deal.
Republicans and conservatives want to maintain a program that is the most expensive item in the federal budget.
Republicans and conservatives want to strengthen a program that takes money from those who work and gives it to those who don’t.
Republicans and conservatives want to fix a program that is not a legitimate function of government in the first place.
Republicans and conservatives want to preserve a program that has a huge government bureaucracy.
Republicans and conservatives want to protect a program that is the cornerstone of the welfare state.
Republicans and conservatives want to fortify a program that fosters dependency on the government.
Republicans and conservatives want to conserve a program that is funded by theft.
Republicans and conservatives want to redesign a program that is by nature coercive.
Republicans and conservatives want to secure a program that crowds out real charity.
Republicans and conservatives want to sustain a program that discourages private savings.
Republicans and conservatives want to prolong a program that is unsustainable.
Republicans and conservatives want to reinforce a program that is inherently immoral.
Republicans and conservatives want to privatize a program that should not exist in the first place.
Republicans and conservatives want to save a program that is incompatible with a free society.
Eighty years of socialism is long enough. It is long past time that the truth be told about Social Security. It is an intergenerational, social-engineering, income-transfer, wealth-redistribution welfare program. It doesn’t need to be reformed, redesigned, or replaced. It needs to be abolished.