Bill Nelson, Rick Scott: Mum’s the word on Social Security
Is Social Security important?
It seems like a rhetorical question, given that millions of people see the system as a single source lifeline. Yet the answer become less clear with each passing year as the program gets less and less coverage in the campaign cycle of our national elections. In the election between Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson and Republican challenger Rick Scott for the U.S. Senate, the program gets scant attention.
The questions about the program’s longterm financing deserve answers. Over the last 15 years, the size of the unfunded liabilities in the system has grown at more than double the rate of the economy. In other words, the hole in the program’s finances is growing twice as fast as the nation’s ability to fill it.
The consequences of the gaps in the program’s finances are apt to fall on existing seniors who live in Florida. The Social Security Administration expects that about half of the people turning 71 today will be turning 87 in 2034, as benefits are reduced. At this point, experts believe that without change, the program will adjust benefits downward by more than 20 percent. Yet we do not even know how the program would allocate to the individual any reductions required by law.
In response to these troubling statistics, neither candidate in the race to represent Florida in the Senate has offered a coherent message on the program’s future. On the GOP side, candidate Scott has said little, and does not even list Social Security as an issue on his campaign website. Nelson promises to protect the program, but offers scant details about what “protect” should mean. You would think it should be impossible
STATE VIEWPOINT to get elected to Congress without producing some answers in a state where so many seniors are dependent upon Social Security checks to makes end meet.
The candidates’ position on Social Security — or general lack thereof — illustrates the political calculus of addressing the program’s looming insolvency. You can’t mention the problem without mentioning some type of solution. Any solution would contain some unpalatable elements ensured to alienate some segment of voters. So the politicians send the message that system’s benefits are safe without mentioning any of the dangers.
Welcome to the politics of delay, a political strategy in which candidates tell you everything that they will not do, but nothing about what they would do. They attack the flaws in the opponent’s plan, while making a painstaking effort to avoid any position of their own. The politicians reason that if we ignore the issue long enough, no one will notice.
The strategy apparently works pretty well. In 2016, the major political parties nominated the two people who seemed to speak the least about the program the least. In the subsequent presidential election, voter elected a candidate who made the promise to do nothing to the program. His solution effectively argued that economic growth would generate the revenue necessary to put the program back on track.
Nearly two years later, the economy is booming with record jobs and record wages according to the administration. The growth will generate record payroll tax revenue. Yet over that same period of time, the system has generated nearly $2 trillion in unfunded liabilities. That is more than the system has collected in payroll taxes in total. In other words, Congress could have reduced benefit levels to zero on the day Donald Trump took office, and the system would still be worse today than it was when Trump arrived.
How is this possible? It is pretty simple. The Trustees of the program at the time of Trump’s arrival foresaw even larger growth than the economy has delivered. Instead, the record growth fell short of expectations by roughly $16 billion. Between 2017 and 2018, the program’s prospects changed so much that it will need to dip into the Trust Fund four years sooner than expected. Yet, few Americans are asking questions, and politicians aren’t offering answers.
The hard truth is that we don’t know when the system might lapse into insolvency, nor do we know how citizens might be affected. As a result, the election for the Senate in Florida pretty much assures the voters in Florida two things: There will be one winner and millions of losers. Every man, woman, and child in the state who depends on the future of Social Security will lose no matter which candidate wins.