Your Tuesday editorial on saving Social Security was appreciated. (“Steps for saving the safety net.”) Raising the payroll tax cap beyond the arbitrary $118,500 limit is a no-brainer. Indeed, why should payroll taxes be capped at all? If all Social Security tax caps were removed, there would be little need for raising the tax rate percentage or raising the retirement age.
The disability program is a trickier wicket, but most would at least agree that the definition of “disability” needs to be tightened.
Still, these proposed fixes ignore the big issue. People need jobs in order to pay Social Security taxes: Lack of jobs is the problem. The celebration of automation — be it with assembly line robots, digital prompts on telephone call centers, delivery drones, or self-service at every juncture of our lives — is very effectively eliminating the source of the Social Security trust funds. Jobs for people are the obvious answer. Of course, making those jobs as well paid and as interesting and as upwardly mobile as possible not only offers a better life for the employee, it also adds tax revenue to Social Security.
Sadly, our society has been sold the mistaken notion that we save money by “tightening” staff, eliminating “excess” workers and finding ways to force fewer people to do more work for less pay. As a nation, we are losing the ability to work for a living. It is being stolen from us by those who seek larger profits. What a surprise then that fewer people are paying Social Security taxes?
The concept of “shadow work” is the notion that we are absorbing the work once done by others in what amounts to a second-shift job for ourselves. It happens when we make airline connections, assemble our own furniture, trouble-shoot our cable television and computer, or shop online without a knowledgeable sales clerk. We think we are saving money and getting a better product. We aren’t thinking too long or hard about what we are losing.
A job, a work ethic, pride of accomplishment and, yes, a Social Security deduction are becoming historical artifacts in America.
We have so much work that needs to be done in this country. And we have so many people without productive work to do. There is no good reason why America cannot weave these threads together. Social Security trust funds would benefit, of course. But that’s the very least of it.
Dale A. Preboski
Snohomish
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