{{ Proposals to delay the full retirement age are based on the notion that life expectancy has increased. Life expectancy has increased, but primarily for those in the top half of the income distribution. People with lower levels of education, minorities, particularly Blacks and other vulnerable groups, haven’t seen the gains in life expectancy over the last two, three or four decades.
I’m actually for increasing the full retirement age for those who can work longer. For people in the top half of the income distribution, you could figure out what their benefits would average and index it to their monthly earnings, then phase in a big increase in the retirement age for people in the top 10 percent of earnings, a smaller increase for people in the next 10 percent, graduated on down so there would be no increase for people below the average. It would make benefits more progressive and make the system fairer. }}
How would you determine the top 50% or 10% earners? Based on their current income? Wouldn’t people just game the system and decrease their income at the right time?
Seems like basing it on wealth would be more fair. But then you are penalizing people who are responsible and saving for retirement…especially those around the 51% to 60% levels and rewarding those who bought fancy cars every few years and went on vacations they can’t really afford and end up at the 49% level.
Yep. There will always be people with a sufficient understanding of arithmetic to game the system – can’t be helped. {{ LOL }}
But I have faith that Americans tendency to celebrate “racism, ignorance and innumeracy” will keep that number of mathletes very small.
Just look at the number of people who claim SS at 62 (without a medical diagnosis that predicts a shortened lifespan), thus leaving about $100,000 on average on the table.
Not sure where the NYT is getting its numbers. Looking at life expectancy differences between 1980 and 2015, for the US as a whole the CDC tells us the increase was 6.8%. For blacks the increase was 10.8%. The increase in actual years was also greater for blacks.
NYT probably uses numbers that went beyond 2015 because life expectancy did improve proportionally for the ‘black America’s’ through 2010, and then began to stall and even reverse after that. Your 2015 cite does not include the the trends from 2015 till now. For example: