Friday, June 4, 2010

What do Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Dave Barry, Tom Clancy, Hillary Clinton, Glenn Close, Larry David, Stephen King, David Letterman and Arnold Schwarzenegger have in common? All will be hit by the ‘new Social Security notch.’

All these celebrities were born in 1947 and thus will be affected by the 'new Social Security notch' I wrote about for the Center for Retirement Research. Allgov.com reports on these victims here. Although I doubt any will be suffering on account of the notch, it's a clever way of illustrating it.

3 comments:

Pops said...

I don't think victim is an appropriate word. If you like the word victim, you should include as victims those born in 1945 and 1946. People aged 65 already on social security and having medicare premiums deducted saw no increase in medicare premiums in 2010. Those turning 65 in 2010 and 2011 will pay higher premiums (along with those who delayed the start of social security), since they don't benefit from the "no decrease in net social security" rules (which mean no increase in medicare premiums for those already on social security) when the cola is zero.

I don't like the word victim myself. What happened was that everyone born in 1946 and before got an unwarranted cola and jump in benefits because of the jump in energy prices in the summer of 2008. If you want to make things fairer, you should take away that cola and spread it out over 2009, 2010, and 2011 (2.0%, 1.9%, and 1.9%). Then you could recover the excess money paid to everyone born in 1946 and before and also collect more in medicare premiums from everyone born in 1944 and before. This way, there would be no "victims," only more money in the two funds, social security and medicare.

Good luck getting congress to vote to recover money already paid out. Like all congresses, they will only be interested in handing out money to "victims." Your use of such a loaded word does not promote rational discussion.

Andrew G. Biggs said...

Pops,
I was using the word 'victims' jokingly. Your other point about Medicare Part B premiums is also true. I've written about that elsewhere. All good points. thanks.

Unknown said...

good discussion