For many years the age at which you get “full” Social Security benefits has been 65. But 70 or even 75 is probably more realistic for most people, and I mean realistic in the spirit of fairness, and I say this only partially because we expect more people to turn 65 over the next 20 years (including me) than the current Social Security system can afford.

Living longer, fewer children

This is the obvious, heavily-discussed demographic reason for raising the retirement age. We have more people living to 80, 90 or 100 than 50 years ago. At the same time, the average number of children per family has dropped. Instead of an estimated 10 workers for every retiree, we are moving toward having only three workers supporting each person who gets Social Security and other old-age benefits.

It might be good for the U.S. in the long run to have fewer people — less drain on natural resources, shorter lines at airports, easier to find parking downtown, etc. — but an awful lot of our poliitical and economic planning has been based on the assumption that growth was not only good but necessary. The demographic calculations that originally set the retirement age and how much needed to be paid in by workers assumed more population growth than we’ve had. An extreme case of how no-growth or negative growth can turn retirement promises into an unfulfillable burden is General Motors, which has shrunk mightily from its 1960s peak but is taking care of more — and longer-lived — retirees than ever, to the point where the company now reportedly spends more on retirees than on buying steel to make cars.

The retiree burden is also behind some of the recent shifts in the airline industry. The up-and-comers like Southwest and JetBlue are comparatively young companies that aren’t paying out nearly as high a percentage of their incomes to retirees as older airlines like United, Delta or Northwest. In fact, it looks like the only way the old airlines can compete is to go bankrupt and repudiate their retirement obligations. This may be sound laissez faire “let ‘em starve” capitalist doctrine, but the way we have things structured in the U.S. right now, taxpayers end up paying at least some of the promised airline retirement benefits through the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, an agency already paying massive sums to retirees abandoned by once-strong companies ranging from Bethlehem Steel to Polaroid.

Of course, if we taxpayers decide to cut off added pension benefits beyond Social Security to these tossed-aside retirees the builders who now put up $200,000+ “luxury retirement villas” instead of affordable trailer parks are going to scream like stuck pigs — with voices amplified by powerful, free-handed lobbyists.

Working until 72 or 75 is only fair

But aside from the practical and demographic aspects of retirement financing, it is right for today’s workers to delay their retirements. When Social Security and other modern American pension plans were first conceived in the 1930s, less than half the population went all the way through high school, and only a few went to college. It was common for a young man to start working full-time at 16, and working on a family farm or in a family business well before that age was considered normal, not child abuse.

Now most people don’t start doing real, full-time work until they’re at least 20, and many delay work force entry until they finish college at 22 or even 23 or 24. (This doesn’t count those who go on to grad school; they’re still a relatively small percentage of the total population.) Someone who starts work at age 21 and retires at 70 is putting in the same number of years as someone who starts working at 16 and retires at 65. Not only that, the person who retires at 70 today is likely to live for more years after retirement than someone who, 20 years ago, retired at age 65.

I accept the fact that I will work for at least another 20 or 25 years before I can retire. I’m 51, and no matter what I hear from the mouths of government people and political candidates, and whether we move toward a national retirement plan based on private investments or beef up the current Social Security system, the cold hard fact remains that I am statistically likely to live at least 10 years longer and be able to work at least 10 years later in life than my parents or grandparents.

You might as well accept this reality yourself. And when a politician tells you he or she has a plan to keep the retirement age where it is now — especially if that politician says this can be done without raising taxes — you should visualize a large, blinking sign over that politician’s head that says, “Liar! Liar!” no matter what party flag that politician waves, and vote accordingly.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 16th, 2004 at 3:08 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.