The National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare explains in great detail how this strategy of "generational warfare" is nothing new. The NPR, who usually misleads us about Social Security disability, notes in one article:
Economics reporter Jim Tankersley, now with The Washington Post, argued in an article last fall at the National Journal that the baby boomer generation has sucked a disproportionate share of resources out of the country, calling his own father "a parasite." --- But while it's true that today's young people will eventually grow old themselves, government budgets are about the present. And those who are now old are better protected than children and youth.
As of lately we have seen many people trying to use generational warfare (pitting the young against the old, the sons against their fathers, the Generation Xers against the Baby Boomers) when arguing against ObamaCare --- saying that younger and healthier people must pay for older and sicker people --- and claiming how it's not fair.
First of all, let me say, we ALL get old (if we are lucky), but the less you earn, the less you will have to pay for ObamaCare. But the super-rich and the Republicans (the party of the rich) have been complaining and trying to undermine, sabotage and repeal ObamaCare --- because starting this year, the rich will be taxed 3.8% on their capital gains to expand Medicaid for those who can't otherwise afford healthcare insurance.
And the GOP (the corporate guardians) knows very well that the insurance companies (like the ones the taxpayers bailed out) also don't like the profit-limiting consumer protections that comes with ObamaCare.
A few people (usually the wealthiest with the biggest megaphones) have been using talking points to say that forcing the super-rich to pay for the healthcare for the abject poor is a "massive redistribution of wealth" --- and calling ObamaCare a "government takeover of healthcare.” It was repeated so often (and so dutifully reported by the mainstream media) that Politifact chose it as the Lie of the Year in 2010.
But most people (with much softer voices, thanks to Citizens United) are saying that forcing the taxpayers to subsidize corporations, finance CEO golden parachutes, fund over-paid defense contractors, quantitative easing, and big bank bailouts is also a "massive redistribution of wealth" when sucking resources from the bottom to the top by using "reverse trickle-down economics".
Also, many taxpayers resent the "redistribution of their wealth" to provide food stamps to under-paid workers at Walmart because the multi-billionaire-heirs of Sam Walton are too cheap, greedy and petty to pay their workers a real "living wage" --- or to feed the unemployed who had their jobs offshored to low-wage countries just to pay CEOs multi-million-dollar salaries every year.
50% of all wage earners in the U.S. take home $27,500 a year or LESS --- so many (if not most) would be eligible for Medicaid, or will only pay a very low subsidized premium for healthcare insurance (if their employer doesn't already offer them an employer-paid group healthcare plan; or if they aren't on their parent's plan). Most of the complaints we've been hearing about on Fox News are from people earning upper-income wages, and/or who also had cheap (but lousy) insurance policies to begin with.
But just like ObamaCare, when the Social Security and Medicare plans were first initiated, many people used to complain back then as well. Edwin E. Witte, while working under U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, developed the legislation that became the Social Security Act of 1935 --- and he is sometimes called "the father of Social Security". In remarks he made on the 20th anniversary of the Social Security Act on August 15, 1955 he said:
What we now call "public assistance" or "general assistance" was established in every colony early in its history, under the old English designation of "poor relief." That also was done in the later States, in their earliest days. The principle that when people have no other means of subsistence, they must be supported from public funds, has always been a part of the American way of life.
During his presidential campaign in 1964, Barry Goldwater's opposition to the New Deal and his criticism of its centerpiece program of "old age insurance" marked his rise as a leading conservative Republican. His first public political statement was an open letter to President Franklin Roosevelt decrying New Deal economic policies. As a young Republican senator in the 1950s, Goldwater criticized Republican President Dwight Eisenhower for failing to dismantle the welfare state. In his 1960 political book The Conscience of a Conservative, Goldwater referred to the New Deal as “Socialism-through-Welfarism” and called for its repeal, including its "social welfare programs." The book had influenced countless conservatives, helping to lay the foundation for The Reagan Revolution in 1980 --- and then later, "trickle-down economics" (The Pope recently reminded us how well that worked out). Needless to say, President Lyndon B. Johnson beat Goldwater in a landslide --- the American people weren't buying Goldwater's spin.
Now Social Security is the financial mainstay for 95% of us who eventually can't work any longer (And the GOP wants to raise the retirement age to 70 when it's almost impossible for anyone over 50 who was laid off since 2008 to get a job today.)
A "divide and conquer" strategy is being used (with multiple lies and misinformation) by shills for the super-rich in an attempt to turn the young against the old on a proposed plan to increase Social Security taxes on 5% of the top wage earners.
As a 58-year-old "Baby Boomer" in 2013, I can remember very vividly when I first left home in 1973 to be on my own. As it is for most people, my first job didn't pay all that well, so every dollar counted. Sure, back then, I might have thought I wouldn't live past 30 (or that I was invincible, and would never die). So yes, back then, I might I have wished I wasn't "forced" to pay all those Social Security and Medicare taxes from my paycheck. But in hindsight, I'm glad I did. (Who knows, as a young man, I might have just blown all that extra money on another case of beer every week.)
In those days, I wasn't focused all that much on my future: becoming 65 years old back then seemed like a 1,000 years away to me. But since then, I've also learned that the older one becomes, the faster time seems to pass you by. But it's difficult to explain that to a someone who's only 18 years old today. To a 5-year-old, Santa Claus won't be back for an eternity.
As I said: If we are lucky, we ALL get old, but most of us do not earn enough to save for a proper retirement. And even if we did earn adequate wages, many of us (if not most) still might not save enough money anyway --- after all, there's always SOMETHING to pay for --- we get laid off from our jobs, we get married, we have children, our cars breaks down, we become sick or disabled, or maybe something at the local mall goes on sale that we feel we absolutely MUST have (even if it means going into debt).
So paying Social Security and Medicare taxes during our working years, for our retirement and healthcare in our older years, is the very best insurance we can ever buy in life. But now, another "think tank" is trying to undermine the financial security of our Social Security Trust Fund.
A group named Third Way supports the TPP trade agreement that the Center for Economic Policy and Research says will be disastrous for U.S. workers. Jon Cowan is president of Third Way and Jim Kessler is the senior vice president for policy. Together they recently co-authored an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal attacking Senator Elizabeth Warren for her stand on Social Security, saying:
"Sen. Warren wants to increase benefits to all seniors, including billionaires, and to pay for them by increasing taxes on working people and their employers. Her approach requires a $750 billion tax hike over the next 10 years that hits mostly Millennials and Gen Xers, plus another $750 billion tax on the businesses that employ them."
This entire paragraph to totally untrue. Senator Elizabeth Warren supports Senator Tom Harkin's plan (S.567, the Strengthening Social Security Act) which says, "To help extend the life of the trust fund the Act phases out the current taxable cap of $113,700 so that payroll taxes apply fairly to every dollar of wages."
There's also been some discussion on "means-testing" so that billionaires, who don't need these benefits, won't be able to receive Social Security benefits. And the only Millennials and Gen Xers that will see any hike in payroll taxes will be those earning over $113,700 a year after phasing out the proposed "cap".
If it weren't so nefarious, it would almost be laughable that Third Way uses the phrases "working people" and "employers" when they are really referring to millionaires and billionaires, not working-class wage earners or small business owners.
Their propaganda piece goes on to say:
"Even more reckless is the populists' staunch refusal to address the coming Medicare crisis. In 2030, a typical couple reaching the eligibility age of 65 will have paid $180,000 in lifetime Medicare taxes but will get back $664,000 in benefits. Given that this disparity will be completely unaffordable, Sen. Warren and her acolytes are irresponsibly pushing off budget decisions that will guarantee huge benefit cuts and further tax hikes for Gen Xers and Millennials in a few decades."
These "budget decisions" that Third Way mentions are really for cutting benefits for the middle-class, working-class and the poor --- such as using chained-CPI for lower cost-of-living adjustments, and using Paul Ryan's "voucher plan" for Medicare --- rather than raising taxes on those who can easily afford to pay just a little bit more (by raising taxes on 5% of those who generate incomes over $113,700 a year from wages, not capital gains.)
There are no further Medicare tax hikes scheduled for Gen Xers and Millennials, as there are no further tax hikes for anyone else (and there doesn't have to be). The temporary payroll tax holiday expired for everybody in 2013, so payroll taxes for everyone only went back to where they were previously (similar to how the Bush tax cuts had also elapsed this year). And even if Medicare taxes were ever increased, it would not only go up on everyone, but it would benefit everyone as well, as Medicare is a collective plan that benefits seniors --- and as I said, most Gen Xers and Millennials eventually become seniors themselves.
The Third Way's op-ed piece in the right-wing Wall Street Journal is using a right-wing strategy of "divide and conquer" --- dividing the young and old --- but the young also have older parents, and the old have younger children. The REAL divide is between ultra-rich and everybody else.
It's mostly the top 1% (or 5%, depending who you ask) who doesn't want to contribute to Social Security or Medicare. (Actually, according to the Social Security Administration, 94.5% of all wage earners in the U.S. make less than the current "cap" of $113,700 a year --- members of Congress make more).
So again, when Third Way talks about "further tax hikes", they are mostly concerned about the millionaires and billionaires paying a little more --- those imaginary "job creators" who were thoroughly debunked in Business Insider last week.
Supposedly, Third Way is "centrist" think tank (although they sound conservative), but according to an article in Salon, it sounds more like a split between a few "economic plutocrats" and "economic populists" within the Democratic Party --- that others have described as "pro-corporate" Democrats and progressive Democrats (pro-workers).
Salon writes: "Perhaps most disappointingly, coming from a nominally Dem-aligned think tank, Third Way adopts conservative generational warfare [and] hits mostly Millennials and Gen Xers...When you take a look at Third Way’s Wall Street-heavy board of trustees, this begins to make a lot of sense...These are the people who will be forced to pay higher taxes."
The argument Third Way makes isn't really about any social, political or ideological divides between the young and old, but the economic divide between the very wealthy and everybody else. Being able to earn a living wage during our working years, and then being able to later retire when we become too old or sick to work anymore, should be a common goal for most of us (say like 95%).
But Third Way is using the same old strategy that the GOP has been using for decades, dividing all types of different classes of people (black and white, middle-class and poor, North and South, makers and takers, women and men, Catholics and Atheists, gays and straights, etc.) in their attempt to win an argument and sway the public's opinion. The Republicans have used this strategy to divide all kinds of different classes of people --- all EXCEPT the super-rich (the top 0.01%) and everybody else (the other 99.99%).
The Republicans are currently attempting to divide those in the military and senior citizens by introducing legislation that would cancel out the next two years of sequestration cuts for the Pentagon by putting a heavier burden on senior citizens by changing the way cost-of-living adjustments are calculated for Social Security (chained-CPI) --- rather than just taxing the capital gains of the super-wealthy as regular wages, or taxing their capital gains for Social Security, or raising or eliminating the "cap" for Social Security taxes --- ANYTHING but the taxing the very rich.
It's always been the GOP's plan "save" for the rich and "cut" for everyone else. Now it appears that the self-described "centrist" think tank called Third Way is taking a page right out of the GOP play book.
Last year in a New York Times opinion piece Old vs.Young, the author claims that the young are less hostile to Social Security cuts and favor private accounts for Social Security (I found this very difficult to believe). The author goes on to say that Medicare "is a transfer program from young to old" and pontificates:
"The young are generally losing out to the old. On a different subject, Warren E. Buffett, 81, has joked that there really is a class war in this country — and that his class is winning it. He could say the same about a generational war."
First of all, Warren Buffett was NOT joking about winning the class war. Before the Great Recession in 2006 Warren Buffett had said they were winning. In the aftermath of the Great Recession in 2011 he said they won. And secondly, the same can not be said about a generational war, where both the young and old will lose if they don't stand up to people like the fake Democrats at Third Way who want to cut Social Security rather than tax the uber-rich a little more.
So if you are a Millennial or Gen Xer today, remember, you too will eventually be one of those "old people" that Third Way is now trying to marginalize. Organizations like Third Way will be attacking you too when you also get older.
Investing in Social Security is an investment in yourself, but the super-rich don't want to help you pay for your retirement when you get too old or sick to work for them any longer. They already "got theirs" --- just like the multi-millionaire talking heads on Fox News also "got theirs" --- they just don't want us to "get ours".
* To young people and old people alike: Tell these fake Democrats (via this petition) "Make your Wall Street funders public and stop attacking Elizabeth Warren's popular ideas."
* Also read: A Brief History of Attacks on Social Security
** Also read: Veterans Face a New Threat: Proposed cuts to Social Security beneficiaries will also affect those who receive veterans' disability benefits, Veterans pensions and military retirement pay, by using chained-CPI (rather than CPI-E) to calculate annual cost-of-living adjustments (COLAS).
