Essay on The policy game: Understanding U.S. public policy making
Social Security is a program created to protect financially vulnerable social groups; this program secures a basic income level after retirement age, life insurance and disability payments for workers. The core idea of the program is that the fund invested by younger generations into Social Security can be used to secure the well-being of retired citizens, and the incomes of future generations will be financed by Social Security payments of their offspring (Theodoulou & Kofinis, 2012). However, most younger Americans have a dim view on the perspectives of Social Security because its solvency is questionable now.
There are several factors affecting the financial viability of Social Security. One major driver of the costs of Social Security is the retirement of baby boomers – the proportion of retired people is growing, while the number of active workers is declining (Theodoulou & Kofinis, 2012). Furthermore, the birthrates are declining in the United States, so it is reasonable to expect that in the future Social Security will experience even bigger problems. In addition, the average life expectancy grows and therefore the drain of Social Security increases.
An additional factor is the influence of AARP Inc. (or former American Association of Retired Persons). This organization aims to protect the rights of seniors, and currently it has over 38 million members aged 50+ (Theodoulou & Kofinis, 2012). AARP strongly opposes suggested alterations of Social Security and Medicare that are aimed at improving financial balance of these programs. Such measures as changing Medicare coverage and adding more limits to optimize costs or increase of the retirement age are not implemented to a large extent due to the opposition from AARP.
In the current situation, the resources of Social Security are expected to be drained in the 2030s (Theodoulou & Kofinis, 2012). There might be different alternatives to Social Security such as private retirement accounts, 401k retirement planning or the alternative scheme suggested by AMAC (the Association of Mature American Citizens). This program includes lower benefits for high-earners, increasing retirement age and securing greater access to income for all retired citizens. Therefore, it is either necessary to change Social Security scheme to make it work for future generations, or to start using another approaches to securing income in the retirement age.
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