For the first time since the New Deal, a majority of Americans are headed toward a retirement in which they will be financially worse off than their parents, jeopardizing a long era of improved living standards for the nation's elderly, according to a growing consensus of new research.Any of this 'research' note the growing number retiring compared to the smaller number working?
The Great Recession and the weak recovery darkened the retirement picture for significant numbers of Americans. And the full extent of the damage is only now being grasped by experts and policymakers.
Obviously, none of these wizards read Rantburg.
There was already mounting concern for the long-term security of the country's rapidly graying population. Then the downturn destroyed 40 percent of Americans' personal wealth, while creating a long period of high unemployment and an environment in which savings accounts pay almost no interest. Although the surging stock market is approaching record highs, most of these gains are flowing to well-off Americans who already are in relatively good shape for retirement.
I have a little money in the stock market, but I am 40% less well-off than I was before the great let-down.
Liberal and conservative economists worry that the decline in retirement prospects marks a historic shift in a country that previously has fostered generations of improvement in the lives of the elderly. It is likely to have far-reaching implications, as an increasing number of retirees may be forced to double up with younger relatives or turn to social-service programs for support.
Moving back in with the children? Shades of the 1930's!
Advocates for older Americans are calling on the federal government to bolster Social Security benefits or to create a new layer of retirement help for future retirees. Maybe Obama can re-invent Bush's 401k plan.
Others want employers and the government to do more to encourage retirement savings and to discourage workers from using the money for non-retirement purposes. But those calls have been overwhelmed by concern about the nation's fast-growing long-term debt, which has left many policyÂmakers focused on ways to trim Social Security and other retirement benefits rather than increase them.
By the 1960s, retirees also benefited from universal health insurance through Medicare and Medicaid, sharp increases in Social Security benefits and new protections enacted by the federal government for workers who received traditional pensions, which for decades were a standard employee benefit.
Benefits which now have overwhelmed the 'system'. So let's get more benefits! What could possibly go wrong?
The changes rescued millions of retirees from poverty, while lifting millions of others to prosperous retirements symbolized by vacation cruises, recreational vehicles and second homes.
| Wait -- so the people who haven't enough in retirement savings paid for such luxuries for the children of the Depression? How is that fair? |
Which is where, I suppose, we need The Lightbringer to step in.
Recent policy changes aimed at bolstering Americans' retirement prospects have only contributed to the growing inequality.
Divided into the savvy and the stoopid. But now the bottom line of this front-page WaPo "news" -
The government grants at least $80 billion a year in tax breaks to encourage retirement savings in 401(k)-type accounts. But the biggest benefits go to upper-income people who can afford to put aside the most for retirement, allowing them to reap the biggest tax breaks. Someone making $200,000 a year and contributing 15 percent of pay to a retirement account would receive about a $7,000 subsidy from the federal government in the form of a tax break, whereas workers earning $20,000 making the same 15 percent contribution would get nothing because they don't earn enough to qualify for a deduction. Someone making $50,000 and making the 15 percent contribution would receive only about a $2,100 tax deduction.
Gee, that's not 'fair'. We need to redistribute that!
Some lawmakers and other advocates say the best way to cope with the growing gap would be to further expand Social Security and Medicare benefits, or to add another layer of taxpayer-subsidized savings that workers could use only for retirement.
More government to help those too stoopid to think for themselves!
"We need to do more to help American families cope with this looming retirement crisis," Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), chairman of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, said at a hearing late last month. "HardÂworking Let's build up the middle class, while we're at it!
| I deserve to weigh what I did on my wedding day, and to have the energy to go with it. After all, I am considerably older than I was then. Also, a pony! Get on that right away Senator Harkin. |
Another poor choice made by the 'average' worker. Retire now with less, or later with more? Adults will wait.
Health-care costs continue to outpace inflation, meaning more out-of-pocket expenses for future seniors. Retirees are also slated to pay more for their health care with Medicare premiums, which are deducted from the Social Security checks of senior citizens, set to rise from 12.2 percent to 14.9 percent by 2030.
Huh? I thought ObumbleCare was going to fix that? The article concludes with the sad tale of a guy who lost his high-paying job ten years ago and can't afford to retire.