Kemp on the Third Rail

Kemp on the Third Rail

Cutting Social Security benefits isn't the answer

The only way to ensure the solvency of America's retirement system and guarantee workers a higher standard of living when they retire is to make every worker an owner. Transform Social Security into a pre-funded private investment program and finance it by allowing workers to place at least half the current payroll taxes into personal accounts, to which they have full ownership rights. The chief actuary of the Social Security Administration, Stephen Goss, recently scored a plan published by the Institute for Policy Innovation that meets all of the above criteria - large personal accounts, no tax increases, no benefit cuts - and concluded that workers owning large personal accounts would receive nearly 60 percent more in retirement benefits than Social Security currently promises.