We are at the point where there are about 3 workers for every social security recipient. Or, at least we would be if there were enough jobs right now. It doesn't take a brilliant economist to realize that we need more workers, or fewer SS recipients, or each worker has to pay more, or each recipient has to get less, or we will have to borrow to pay SS.

So if we are Barack Obama and his lackeys what we do is mount a public relations campaign that positions Social Security payments as "entitlements," which somehow has taken on an ugly connotation even though it is a perfectly good word. (You are entitled to the money in your bank account.)

There are two kinds of entitlements -- those that people paid for and those that they didn't. Social Security is a "paid for" example. 

Next we tell the public that we are going to cut entitlements. Many of our supporters will shout: "Hoo-rah. Nobody should get something from the government that I'm not getting."

The entitlements that are cut won't include the "unpaid for" entitlements, like welfare programs for people who have sex irresponsibily or who are in the United States illegally. These are liberal supporters.

The entitlements that will get cut include payments to people who had no choice but to place their faith in the government by paying mandatory FICA taxes or getting fined or jailed as the alternatives.

How might we reduce Social Security payments? Here are the ways:

(1)   Pay the average recipient less, perhaps based on need.

The unfairness of this is that many of the people who need Social Security payments less are the people who, because of higher earnings over more years, paid more into it. 

Are not the people who paid more into the system entitled to more out of the system? The answer is no -- if one agrees with Karl Marx's economic philosophy of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

The answer is yes if we value the quaint American cultural value of "fairness" as it was defined before it started being spun semantically to sell essentially unfair programs and concepts by liberals.

(2)   Reduce the number of Social Security recipients.

One way to do this is to require people to wait to draw Social Security until they get older than 65. There are two potential flaws in this strategy:

·         One flaw is that this will keep older people in the labor force longer, thus reducing job opportunities for younger people.

·         The other flaw is that as the skills of older workers become less in demand there is a risk of an earnings gap between the cessation of employment income and the start of Social Security income. Individuals would have to plan financially to bridge this gap. This seems unlikely to be feasible except under greatly improved economic conditions.

The second way to reduce the number of Social Security recipients is to shorten their lives by withholding health care at a certain point in aging or health decline. 

The plans drawn up by our government for socialized medicine (euphemistically called by the more palatable name of universal health care) provide for the costs of individual medical treatment funding to be weighed against the individual benefits of treatment in terms of years remaining of quality life.

In raw economic terms think of an old car. If it needs a water pump you might fix it to keep it running. If it needs a transmission you might decide to junk it. Who knows what expensive repair might be needed next?  Besides, the old hack doesn't run as well as the newer models like those bearing the ACORN marquis.

There would be no Social Security problems if seniors were Redwood trees or polar bears. Liberals would be scrambling to preserve them.

Chuck

I would like it very much if the starry-eyed liberal media would spare me the comparisons between Obama and Jesus. They maketh me to blaspheme. 

Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God and the spiritual leader of Christianity which He founded 2000 years ago. Obama of south Chicago is the son of a divorced drunk and is a politician who is not yet in office and hasn't done much except gather questionable associates and get elected.

Jesus' Mother was reportedly a virgin at the time of His birth. There is no report that Obama's mother, presumably a nice lady, was a virgin at the time of his birth.

Jesus died for me. Obama has done nothing for me to date.

This is not to disrespect Obama or his parents, please understand, but let's skip the deity crap.

The argument that Obama is like Jesus may gain some credibility if Obama walks across the top of the water in the Reflecting Pool in the summertime without getting his feet wet, or if he can start out with a basket full of fish and feed the nation.