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Home Front: Politix

Obama Floats Social Security Tax Hike

2007-09-24

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., is considering a major tax hike on the rich to shore up the nation's Social Security system. "If we kept the payroll tax rate exactly the same but applied it to all earnings and not just the first $97,000," Obama wrote this week in an Iowa newspaper, "we could eliminate the entire Social Security shortfall."

Advocating tax increases works so well for Dhimmicrats in national elections. Just ask Walter Mondale, Mike Dukakis, and John Kerry. Notice Bill Clinton never made that mistake.

Obama's idea, which he described on the op-ed page of Friday's Quad City Times as being "one possible option" and not a formal plan, would raise more than $1 trillion over 10 years by subjecting income of more than $97,000 to a 12.4 percent tax. Half of the tax would be paid by employees and half would be paid by employers.

Obama is floating the idea of a tax hike on the rich as a way of assuring lower- and middle-income voters that he sees an option for ensuring Social Security's solvency that would not burden them. Obama has been indirectly criticized by Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., for suggesting on ABC News' "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" that a higher retirement age should be "on the table."

Posted by:Steve White

#6 It makes no difference whether YOU think increased SS taxes would just get urinated away, or whether YOU will ever see a penny back; it only matters that a majority of voters believe THEY will come out ahead. (And they don't even actually have to come out ahead, they just have to be convinced they will, and that, given the state of the education system today, is not hard.)

Posted by: Glenmore 2007-09-24 11:28

#5 Remember folks, money that the SSA takes in now over and above what's required to pay beneficiaries is used -- required by law, in fact -- to buy Treasury bonds. Those bonds are supposed to be redeemed when needed, but in the meantime the politicos -- both the Congress and the White House, and both parties -- use the money as they wish. There is and never will be a 'lock-box', per Al Gore.

So what Obama really wants to do here is inject a big chunk of cash into the Appropriations process. Oh, they'll give the SSA their bonds. And the next time it looks like those bonds might actually have to be cashed, they'll .. raise taxes again.

Posted by: Steve White 2007-09-24 11:25

#4 I know I'm not likely to see a penny of the money Mr. Wife and I paid into Social Security over the years, no matter how high the tax is raised.

Posted by: trailing wife 2007-09-24 11:06

#3 do you have ANY doubts that any tax raised to "make SS solvent" would be spent by the drunken sailors in Congress for something else? Mr. Lockbox was lying....

Posted by: Frank G 2007-09-24 09:13

#2 Obama is merely stating the obvious - this particular tax increase is inevitable. Think about it - the SS system is insolvent, and a tax on just the wealthiest few percent is not only politically harmless (they wouldn't have voted for you anyway), but is politically beneficial. It engages the 'wealth envy' classes and also shows people you are 'doing something' about Social Security.

Posted by: Glenmore 2007-09-24 07:27

#1 Strong and fair does not mean selling votes. A strong and fair country ensures that justice is true without regard to payoffs. That means making everybody work for their pay if they are truly capable. It also means personal responsibility. Something that has been lost over a short period.

I currently collect $1175 a month from this government "social security" account. That is enough to employ eleven Iranian families. If anyone has ever seen the third world, they would know that this and any other government program is helpful, but also dangerous.

Posted by: newc 2007-09-24 01:25

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