Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-crg!mordor!sri-spam!nike!ucbcad!ucbvax!UNH.CS.CMU.EDU!Hank.Walker From: Hank.Walker@UNH.CS.CMU.EDU Newsgroups: mod.politics Subject: welfare Message-ID: <12228295673.23.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU> Date: Tue, 5-Aug-86 01:54:20 EDT Article-I.D.: RED.12228295673.23.MCGREW Posted: Tue Aug 5 01:54:20 1986 Date-Received: Tue, 5-Aug-86 23:12:12 EDT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: Hank.Walker@unh.cs.cmu.edu Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 51 Approved: poli-sci@red.rutgers.edu 1. You are confusing Reagan and Regan with regard to the women and jewelry (not diamonds) comment. 2. The statement that fathers split to make the mother eligible for means-tested benefits is highly dubious. Most of those on welfare are unwed teenage mothers, or divorcees. Many states have welfare laws designed to keep the husband around in a married couple, and the federal government has taken action recently (seen somewhere in the New York Times) to force other states to change their laws so that they do not cause family breakup. The fathers in the unwed mother case don't split since they were never around. They don't have any money anyway. Remember the high black teenage unemployment rate? The divorcees can get off welfare when their ex-husbands start providing child support. 3. Massachusetts has had a workfare program for a number of years, as has Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania program isn't so good since it doesn't really provide training, and has too much of a make-work element. The Massachusetts program has been relatively successful at getting people off welfare with a combination of welfare, training, and work. 4. Most pension plans have unfunded future liabilities. Since there are about 105 million working and at least 26 million retired Americans, it is hardly surprising that there is a $10T liability, or about $95,000 per working person. That comes to $9500 a year if you are retired for 10 years. There's no problem if you make sure that there is sufficient surplus built up to handle potential future deficits. For example, a surplus is building now to handle the deficit that will come when Baby Boomers retire. This surplus is being generated by those Baby Boomers. By changing the law, you ensure that you can always cover the liability. The law has already been changed so that the retirement age will rise to 67, and taxes will increase. Future liability is increasing, but so are the taxes to pay for it. Current retirees got a good deal. Future retirees won't get a good deal because their money could have been earning higher interest in savings accounts. The Social Security system is no longer a pyramid scheme, since a long-term plan to reconcile taxes and payments is in place. Future economic developments may require adjustments (as has been necessary in the past), but I don't see how you can predict collapse. A separate issue for the long-term future is one raised by Nils Nilsson in the Summer 1984 issue of AI Magazine. If productivity keeps on increasing even at relatively low rates, we may find it difficult to consume all the goods and services produced. Longer schooling and earlier retirement help some, but only for so long. If this situation comes true, then we may be lowering, rather than increasing, the retirement age 100 years from now. -------