Tornado Alley (PROG)

[wbmw]

Sadly, I think it's a train wreck ready to happen. I wish it wouldn't, but Social Security, while meant with good intentions in it's original design, is unsustainable unless we change up our spending priorities.

I think you're misinformed. Social Security is quite sustainable, as Stephanie showed in her response. Medicare, on the other hand, is losing quite a bit of money, but many blame rising health care costs as the primary driver. Hence, Obama's health care reform put the money in place to sustain the program for another 10 years or so. After that, there needs to be some serious bending of the cost curves. Maybe learning the practices from successful health centers like the one your wife works for is part of that.

But all that aside, I think you're being overly careless of the consequences of removing the fundamental safety net holding the senior citizen population in good health and welness. Don't forget that these people have been paying into the system their entire lives. The payroll tax deductions were their money, so it is quite careless indeed to think that they should now go without the benefits.

On the other hand, I agree that there's a deficit problem that needs to be addressed - but I believe it needs to be done through a combination of cuts as well as increases in revenues. I believe in cutting things like the Afghanistan war, and I believe in growing revenues, such as letting the Bush tax cuts expire. I believe in closing the corporate tax loopholes and unfair subsidies that aren't benefitting the country. I believe in making sure that the wealthiest class of individuals pay their fair share of taxes, since they are the ones receiving the greatest benefit of this country's governance.

Taxes are part of the Constitution. The only part of taxes I think everyone agrees on is that middle class individuals are already paying too much, and it's not fair to give the tax breaks to those making big investments, so that they can end up with lower marginal tax rates than the people barely getting by with 80 hour work weeks. That is unfair, and we've had an unfair tax code since Reagan changed the entire tax system to benefit the wealthy.

If you really want to benefit this country, you can't take away the benefits from those who need it the most. You just need to get the richest individuals to pay their fair share.