In 1983 Congress passed a Social Security bill that, among other things, raised the retirement age from 65 to 67. This was justified on the basis that life expectancies had gone up a lot since the program started in 1937.
There was something to this. Life expectancy after reaching adulthood (age 25) increased more than seven years over that period. It was reasonable to think that most people could afford to work a couple of years more than in the past.
Everything would have been OK if that's where we had left things. The problem is that Republicans have been obsessed ever since with raising the retirement age even more. This is despite the fact that adult life expectancies have behaved radically differently in recent decades. In 1992 states began collecting education information on death certificates, which means we can now directly see the difference between those with college educations and those without:
People without college degrees saw only a small increase in life expectancy through 2019 and were then absolutely walloped by COVID-19. As of 2021, their adult life expectancy was 1.76 years less than it was in 1992.
Think about this. If we raise the Social Security retirement age to 70, it means that folks without college degrees will have average retirements nearly five years shorter than 30 years ago—even though they'll pay all the same taxes during their working lives.
How can a party that supposedly appeals to the working class justify this? Even if you dismiss COVID as a temporary hiccup, an increase in the retirement age to 70 would still mean that non-college workers would lose about 1½ years of retirement. It's unconscionable.
UPDATE: Overall life expectancy numbers for 2022 were released after I wrote this post and show a significant recovery from the COVID pandemic. Here's an approximate update of chart above:
I suspect that it is high time we demanded that all of the elected "officials" live on SS only from this day on, once they reach 67. No benefits, no retirement, no golden parachutes. See how they like SS....
Ah. Because people shouldn't save for retirement?
...Because not everyone can.
Since when have Republicans been the party that "supposedly appeals to the working class"?
No kidding. Although, it would be fair to say that Republicans have successfully conned blue collar white males in to voting against their own interest, as many have already said and this thread is only like nine posts old.
Bingo. R's don't *represent* the working class, but they absolutely do appeal to them, and quite successfully.
I suppose that's one definition of the word appeal, but I don't think that's the definition that Kevin meant when he said "appeals to the working class." I read it to mean that he was saying the party is desirable to the working class. For which there are probably other, non-economic reasons...
I am always amazed by the sheer numbers of people who keep voting against their own best interests.
"I am always amazed by the sheer numbers of people who keep voting against their own best interests."
Or maybe they are a better judge of their interests than you are.
They keep voting for the Party that wants them to die of easily treatable diseases; that is trying to destroy the unions that used to enable them to be paid what they are worth; that wants to take away the right to plan their families; and that is now openly advocating taking away their most secure retirement benefit.
But yah, I'm sure the culture war issues are really their most critical interests.
Please keep up this supercilious attitude that you should get to decide for others what their best interests are.
People like you get millions of votes for Republicans in every election.
You're not contradicting any of my specific claims. Interesting.
Is that why they didn’t mask or vax during Covid and died in larger numbers, because they were better judges of their own interests?
Zing!
Culture war this, culture war that. It obfuscates a lot.
That would be more convincing if this chart showed life expectancy at 60 or 65.
If you die young retirement age is irrelevant to you.
I strongly suspect that a big reason for the drop in life expectancy is deaths at a young age due to drugs and violence.
If you die during your working years, you pay into the system and get no benefit from it at all. Both numbers would be interesting.
It's unconscionable
that word isn't in the trumpist dick-tionary
“How can a party that supposedly appeals to the working class justify this?”
Easy. Their donors don’t care about the working class at all, and their voters are too distracted by all the culture war red meat the GOP donors feed them to notice that they’re getting their pockets picked.
Something… something… give a working man someone to look down on and he’ll empty his pockets for you…
Will they have? The cap isn’t that low…
Bbbut, COVID-19 was … transitory no?
The impact of the lockdowns will not be transitory. We will be paying for them with lower growth, lower earnings, and higher crime due the next 60 years until all of the children whose learning and social development was damaged age out of the workforce.
The direct impact of COVID on life expectancy was low.
That seems to indicate statistics that you didn't provide and as far as I can tell, don't support your conclusions, because none are in fact, still worse than 2019.
I think we can count on covid's continuing to shorten average lifespan for the indefinite future.
The GOP doesn't represent or appeal to the working class, they represent and appeal to racists and religious fanatics who don't care about getting Social Security as long as it means that the "undeserving" also don't get it and that sinners are punished by law. Let's face it, religion by definition isn't based on reason and those are the people the GOP targets. That a lot of them happen to be working class is a coincidence.
Without bad faith…..
Republicans would have no arguments at all.
Exactly.
I think it would be more relevant to look at life expectancy at 65 or 67. I suspect opioid deaths, which hit all ages of adults, is dragging that average down a fair bit.
I was going to make a similar comment.
Actually older adults have a much lower rate of opioid overdose deaths.
Which is exactly what Ogemaniac said.
Yes, especially in hard hit areas--which tend to be economically depressed.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/u-s-life-expectancy-falls-to-lowest-level-since-mid-1990s-due-to-covid-and-drug-overdoses
Can we get the press to report on this widely and repeatedly?
Also, not all ages are of equal vitality. Adding years to the end does not mean that vitality in, say, late 60s or early 70s is raised.
Because they pass this off as "saving" Social Security, without saying the quiet part out loud: by making sure fewer people reach retirement age before they die and by shortening the period that people can receive their benefits, they will effectively reduce payouts and keep the program in the black.
It is my understanding that when Bismark started the first government pension plan he chose 65 because it would get rid of generals who were blocking him and was old enough that it wouldn't cost that much - the average age at death was considerably less.
bear in mind that life expectancy was skeed down in Bismarck's day by still-high childhood mortality.
Yes, it is much more informative to have separate measures for childhood mortality, and life expectancy for adults.
Raising the retirement age doesn't help if you are not working due to health issues - or not working due to age discrimination, which is illegal, but which is totally not enforced. If the government wants us to work longer, it needs to do a far far better job of protecting the workers from age discrimination.
I am still working - at 72, in tech. But as a consultant. I was over the hill and in general to old to hire more than a decade ago for tech companies. I am not complaining, I am doing well, but I recognize that I am more the exception than the rule.
No, it wasn't. It absolutely was not, and I'm tired of seeing this.
People weren't in any better shape at 65 than they were before that. They were just living a bit longer. The proper reaction of non-sociopaths to "people are living a bit longer in retirement" is "great! folks have a few more golden years to enjoy!" and not "lets see if we can wring a few more years of work out of them."
Where we decide gains in society should accrue is a choice, and the choice of "people are living a bit longer, lets use that gain in value to buy a few more years of the elderly working" is a bad one that should be judged harshly.
Yes, this!
Yeah, what quality of life is it if you've destroyed your knees and suffer more long term untreated diseases?
Someone really ought to point out that working into your golden years might be reasonable for people with desk jobs, but not for the vast majority of carpenters, nurses, commercial fishermen, or any others with physically demanding jobs.
I think it was at The American Prospect where I read a comment to the effect that any elected leader who advocates raising the retirement age for SS should be forced to spend a summer in Phoenix as a roofer. Or maybe spend a year in their late 60s laying carpet, seeing how easy that is on the knees.
Hell, I've got a desk job and it's ruined my back. Additionally I'm just sick of being a programmer for the last 40 years, I am mentally worn out. but I've worked at my government job long enough to get a decent pension in addition to Social Security. Retirement is just over a year away.
I have a couple of friends who are in the 60 or so age range who do more physical jobs and both are in some degree of pain always. I'm trying to convince one of them to stay at his state job with a pension because that will mean he can at least partially retire (he wants to move somewhere where the rent is cheaper, but not cheap enough to make up for the pay cat). The other one has no hope for a decent retirement because she's always held low paying public service jobs, and hasn't worked at any of them long enough to vest a pension. Both are going to have a hard time, making them work until 70 is ridiculous.
It was the Democrats, not the Republicans, who wanted a strict and long lockdowns which would clearly screw over the working class.
Drum links to a Deaton report which concludes: "People with BAs have Zoom. People without BAs don’t have Zoom; they have to go to work."
Apparently, the 79 year old doesn't realize that 97% of Americans use the internet can use Zoom for free.
It's not about paying for Zoom. It's about who has jobs that can be done over Zoom vs. who has jobs that can't.
Exactly.
roboto isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer….
https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Health/us-life-expectancy-rose-2022-deaths-due-covid/story?id=108305740
Don't forget that that 1983 law that raised the retirement age also raised the social insurance taxes. So shorter retirements and paying more for them.
For this to be apples to apples you have to do life expectancy at retirement age. An earlier retirement age doesn't do you any good if you die of a drug overdose when you're 37. What's the change in life expectancy at 65/67/70?
Retiremet age or “full” retirement age? The Wikipedia page for the RIB portion of things says the full retirement age started at 65 and was made 67 in 1960.
Republicans talk about raising the retirement age because some of them think it's a popular idea with their base voters. As rhetoric, it might help them win some elections. But it's the last thing they want to actually enact as law, because that would cost them the next election.