Saving Social Security

...In 1935 Social Security began to change all that...

...That is certainly a dire prospect...

...the best one...

...Moreover, as William Byron, S.J., pointed out at the Woodstock forum, from its beginning Social Security conformed to the principles of Catholic social teaching, among them the little-understood principle of subsidiarity...

...workers are protected by Social Security...

...The savings account built over time could be used by the workers to choose investments...

...At the forum, Matthew Weidinger, a staff member of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security, explained the problem clearly: "If you understand that Social Security is a program that taxes workers today to provide benefits primarily to retirees and other beneficiaries today, then you understand the impact of these changing demographics," he said...

...People could work hard all their lives and yet, at the end, be faced with consignment to the local "poorhouse" or the shame of being "on the county...

...But now Social Security is threatened...

...According to Weidinger, the Archer-Shaw plan proposes to take the current Social Security surplus and distribute it among workers by giving them tax credits to be deposited automatically in savings accounts in the workers' names...

...And many are retiring sooner...

...There is no way that such a diminished number of workers can provide the funds for adequate payments for that number of retirees, if taxes and benefits are maintained at the current rate...

...OF SEVERAL HINDS ABIGAIL MCCARTHY SAVING SOCIAL SECURITY Keep it public At a recent panel discussion at Georgetown University's Woodstock Theological Center titled, "Social Security Reform and Catholic Social Teaching," Sharon Daly of Catholic Charities USA called Social Security "the most successful antipoverty program ever known" (Woodstock Report, June 1999...

...They are living up to twenty years longer than they used to after reaching sixty-five...

...But is the solution proposed by those for whom Weidinger works, Congressmen Bill Archer (R-Tex...

...Where once we had about forty workers per beneficiary, today we have three workers per beneficiary, and by the time I retire there will be only two workers per beneficiary...

...The fact is," concluded Byron, "no individuals or groups, no lower levels of government or private organizations could have done what Social Security began to do in 1935...

...and Clay Shaw (R-Fla...

...That principle limits government by insisting that no higher level of organization should perform a function that can be handled at a lower level by persons who are closer to the problems and closer to the ground...

...One hundred and fifty million U.S...

...Ultimately these beneficiaries would have Commonweal 9 September 10,1999...

...People are having fewer children than they did during the baby boom...

...That was the leading question raised at the Woodstock forum...

...By the year 2034 the ratio of beneficiaries to wage earners will change dramatically...

...It gave the elderly dignity and a modicum of self-sufficiency, and did that for the subsequent sixty-four years...

...And, in Social Security and Its Enemies (Westview Press), political scientist Max Skidmore makes a case for Social Security as America's most efficient insurance program and one function the government can perform more effectively and fairly than the private sector can...

...A solution must be found other than raising the tax a projected 15 percent or cutting benefits by 13 percent...

...There are few today who remember the destitution many elderly faced before the program existed...

...Thus, every year everyone in the work force covered by Social Security would get a tax credit...