Social Security and Taxation

I had a conversation with a more conservative friend of mine this past weekend about taxes and social security. I've been thinking and reading about the issue of social security for some time now with the privatization efforts in full swing, and I've developed a theory, upon which I will elaborate: The desire, on the part of wealthy and middle class Americans, to privatize social security and lower taxes comes less from a philosophical opposition to taxes and more from a fundamental misunderstanding of real poverty. This friend of mine, like many people, constantly complains about taxes. He claims that his working overtime for a week bumped him up into a different tax bracket and he ended up making less for 48 hours than he would have for 40. Now, if this is true, then it was a mistake on the part of his employer and he can file that and get refunded. But that's beside the point. This is really just his latest talking point to use in his justification for drastic tax reform (He supports a flat tax). I feel that many opponents of social security think that it's essentially a welfare system, and they resent it because it's redistributive. And why would they resent something that's at all redistributive? Because of a fundamental misunderstanding of poverty.

OK, let me back up a little bit. First let me note that social security is not in crisis. It's just not. If you oppose it on some philosophical level, fine, but don't lie and says it's in crisis. President Bush probably knows there isn't a crisis, so he's trying to scare people into supporting his agenda. The social security system has been and continues to take in more than in gives out so that it will avoid a crisis when the baby boom generation becomes eligible. We are fifty years or so away from any kind of "crisis" at all, and we could help avoid such a long term problem by not cutting taxes the way we are and not running up $855 billion dollars in deficits over the next decade like our supposedly fiscally conservative Republican brethren would like to do. I'm not going to go into great detail here, but you can read about the fabricated nature of this "crisis" just about anywhere. The Republicans are just wrong on this issue, and the evidence is against them.

But back to my friend. During our conversation I asked him if he actually resented taxes coming out of his paycheck or if he was just saying that because it's the official creed of American conservatism. He said he actually does resent it because he is now poor and needs that extra little bit of money. I reminded him that he makes $23,000 a year, to which he responded, "Exactly! I'm poor. That's the definition of lower middle class." That's when it hit me. He has absolutely no understanding of poverty. So here's a quick lesson for him. According to the U.S. government, the poverty threshold for one person (no dependents) for 2003 was $9,393. Which puts my friend at over twice the threshold. In fact, between him and his two roommates, they are well above the country's average household income.

Furthermore, my friend spent a considerable amount of time trying to convince me that poor folks hate social security. (I guess he should know since he's poor, right?) Now, he couldn't point to a single poor person to back up this ridiculous claim, which highlights how little he knows about poverty. While he whines about a few dollars coming out of his paycheck, other people are making a very weak minimum wage and struggling to pay the rent and put food on the table for their families. And social security helps to relieve this burden for older folks. Elderly people won't have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to feed themselves. And it works. Social security works. It's the most successful social program in our nation's history. It's not in crisis, it helps millions of people, and it hurts nobody. Unless you really want to argue that a few dollars (money that you, too, will see when you become eligible) out of your $23,000/year salary are hurting you. And then you're just being a dick. Taxes are part of the system. Get over it.