By The Numbers - part the thirty seventh

Today brings Krugman's scheduled offering. He takes up the issue, appearing here a few times, about the effect of increasing life-span-at-birth on SS and Medicare. He reaches the same conclusion that I, and other intelligent lifeforms, have: increasing the eligibility ages for them will only hurt the poor and downtrodden, aka the group the Right Wingnut Populists claim to support. But he doesn't offer up any numbers. Well, I'll take up the gauntlet, once again.

Curiously, someone put the column title (not always at an author's discretion), "Nikki Haley Is Coming for Your Retirement", which doesn't make a whole lot of sense, since the NYT is the newspaper of record for the well-to-do, not Joe Sixpack who favors the New York Post and the Murdoch Universe. Be that flaw as it may.

Anyone who says, as Haley does, that the retirement age should rise in line with increasing life expectancy is being oblivious, perhaps willfully, to the grim inequality of modern America. Until Covid struck, average life expectancy at 65, the relevant number, was indeed rising. But these gains were concentrated among Americans with relatively high incomes. Less affluent Americans — those who depend most on Social Security — have seen little rise in life expectancy, and in some cases actual declines.

As offered here in the past, life expectancy at birth has, indeed, risen dramatically since 1900, and a bit less so since 1930 (a reasonable benchmark for SS benefit start):
at birth 1900 - 47
at birth 1930 - M:58 F:62
at birth 2021, est - 76

So, the Evangelical Radical Right Wingnuts scream, "this can't go on!!! nearly 30 fucking years longer!!! this can't go on!!!" They are, per usual, lying.

First and foremost, almost oll of that increase in lifespan has been due to reduction in early death, mostly through drugs and vaccines. In other words, more births lived through working age which led to an increase in SSA revenue compared to 1930. Or another way: the Baby Boomers' incomes were what made generous SS benefits possible for their parents and grandparents. You're welcome. SS was never, and could never be, an 'individual retirement account'; if that had been the implementation, no one would have gotten SS until about when Kennedy was shot, assuming a 30 year work life. It was implemented as a current account system so that those reaching 65 would receive benefits irregardless of how long they had 'contributed' to SS; they didn't contribute. It is just a dedicated tax input.

What actually matters is what's happened to geezer life expectancy over that time frame. If geezers still live about as long as they did in the Good Ole Days, then the bitching is all theatre.

So, what are those numbers?

Here's the numbers, once again
all folks
at 65 (1950) - 13.9
at 65 (2007) - 18.6

poor folks
at 65 (1950) - 13.9
at 65 (2007) - 17.2

So, how to 'save' SS?? The straightforward solution is to simply increase the income level that contributes and, of course, make it progressive just as income tax is supposed to be. For 2023, the max is $160,200. Not even near the 1%-ers' level. There hasn't been an adustment since 1990. Let's do it again. So, yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.

And, just so ya know: those of the Evangelical Radical Right Wingnut Brigade who point to the at-birth numbers and insist that such dramatic increases are in the future imperils 'the rest of us' are lying. Of course. The dramatic increase from 1900 to 2000 (or so) was due to much better medicine (and public health initiatives, which the Evangelical Radical Right Wingnuts hate; it's Socialism and all that) are about done with. The easy 80% (or may be 99.9%) and all that. The improvement in overall survival from cancers and heart diseases is barely out of the noise. Get old enough, and one or the other will get you if dementia (there's no therapy known to work here) doesn't. And, by the bye, ignore 'cancer survival rates' or 'heart disease survival rates' numbers as the answer. What matters is the mean/median length of survival from disease. Just because the survival rate may rise, doesn't mean that the afflicted live longer, just that more of them live long enough to die after the same length of time they always have.

This is the crux of the matter for cancer (2022)

However, overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were only prolonged by a median of 2.80 and 3.30 months

Yeah, that's going to keep lots and lots of geezers on SS so much longer.