Ezra Klein: Why rich guys want to raise the retirement age
is a must-read piece which somehow I had missed before this morning's email from Reader Supported News.
Ezra takes words Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, made to CBS, about raising the retirement age for Social Security. This is a common argument, usually offered by people who really do not themselves need Social Security, that since we now live longer than when the program was established, the age should be raised. People are now getting so many years more to get benefits from the program.
Ezra totally takes that apart. For example, he offers a chart on life expectancy for people retiring at age 65. Since 1977 those in the upper half of income have seen their life expectancy expand by six years, while those in the bottom half have gained only 1.3 years.
Ezra then writes
Ezra takes words Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, made to CBS, about raising the retirement age for Social Security. This is a common argument, usually offered by people who really do not themselves need Social Security, that since we now live longer than when the program was established, the age should be raised. People are now getting so many years more to get benefits from the program.
Ezra totally takes that apart. For example, he offers a chart on life expectancy for people retiring at age 65. Since 1977 those in the upper half of income have seen their life expectancy expand by six years, while those in the bottom half have gained only 1.3 years.
Ezra then writes
If you’re wealthy, you do have many more years to enjoy Social Security. But if you’re not, you don’t. And so making it so people who aren’t wealthy have to wait longer to use Social Security is a particularly cruel and regressive way to cut the program.But there is so much more.
