Ryan Streeter
As I said yesterday, there are presently three modes of thought governing how the political class in Washington wants to think about the monster that is our deficit. This monster is increasingly fed by the out-of-control rising costs in Social Security and Medicare. The three modes go like this:
- Ignore it, mainly, by pretending we can spend money we don’t have on new programs that are supposed to help America surge to greatness. This is the thesis of Obama’s State of the Union address. Sputnik-like ambitions somehow justify taking one’s eyes off of the 9000 (yes, thousand) pound gorilla over there in the corner of the room.
- Focus on spending reductions in hope that, somehow, they will make enough of a dent in our deficit that we can take longer to address the biggest drivers of our deficit. This would be the view of the Republicans who don’t want to talk about Medicare and Social Security, even though they know that all the spending they want to cut accounts for a third of government outlays or less.
- Tackle entitlements head-on by making them the focus of our reform efforts. This is not a popular view. Paul Ryan’s Roadmap, the only plan produced by any member of Congress to make our entitlement programs solvent, garnered 13 cosponsors. That’s because tackling entitlements head-on is unwelcome. Despite the recent nods of support that Ryan’s plan has received, don’t expect any bold statements soon from members of Congress in support of the plan or any of them to offer their own alternatives.
There’s a reason we are in this dilemma: it hasn’t yet risen to the level of a moral challenge.
What do I mean?
Before the baby boomers were born, “the Greatest Generation” made historic sacrifices to fight an overseas enemy in order to make the future safe for freedom and their children. Today, we face a domestic enemy of our own making, but we have yet to muster the same type of common purpose that makes sacrifice possible. In some ways, this enemy is the greatest we have ever faced.
It’s coming, people. We can’t raise taxes or increase GDP enough to fill the yawning, Hades-like gap that is our deficit – the awful canyon between what we have committed our government to spend and what we take in as revenue. And so we need to change our expectations and habits. In other words, we need moral change.
There will be no solution to our deficit crisis unless today’s generation is willing to make a similar sacrifice and change what it expects of the future. We cannot fix Medicare and Social Security – and, by extension, our deficit – if we do not work longer, save more, and expect less from the federal government.
We need to get used to the idea that the government will not pay out whatever health care bills we rack up when we’re old. We will need to use more limited public resources to purchase insurance to cover ourselves, and save more to fill the gaps in whatever Social Security and Medicare don’t cover. In short, we need to fully embrace the virtues of saving, restraint, and mutual assistance. The government will be there for us; just not as much. And so we need to get ready for that.
This won’t be a popular view. But it is our calling. It’s the moral calling of our present generation. If enough Americans get behind this view, elected officials will then be more likely to find the political will necessary to make the right reforms.
Politicians will be reluctant to challenge Americans to change their expectations. They typically are not very good at inspiring people to make the tough choices that moral reality requires. The leaders of civil society - churches, communities, civic groups, business leaders, social networks - will need to make this case and help create a new "greatest generation."
What if a change is made in Social Security that would limit the payments at retirement to those individuals that really need it? A person or couple with a net worth at retirement age of 2-3 million would not need the payments and if they have amass that much wealth the payments would through the roof anyway. Would the program still be in place for the needy that really need it? M. Moreland IN
Posted by: MARK MORELAND SR | January 30, 2011 at 05:12 PM