This Is SO FRUSTRATING! Why Won't Any Of The Elected Federal Office Holders Answer My Questions?

Three months ago I accessed President Obama's page on Facebook and sent him the message which follows. But of course, I have not had a reply.

_____________________________________________________________

Dear Mr. President:

For the past several years now I have been writing to my representatives in the U.S. Congress and the U.S. Senate, sharing my thoughts on Social Security. Sadly, the only replies I have ever received are form letters, none of which answered my questions or remarked on my ideas. Last year I even e-mailed the Obama campaign with my ideas only to receive a reply that stated something to the effect "you should advocate your concerns with your friends and neighbors to arrive at some conclusions/suggestions".

Mr. President, I am a simple man with what I think is a simple and logical idea about how to deal with the Social Security crisis. Unfortunately I do not have access to the data that would help me to prove or disprove my ideas. For example, I have no way of knowing the aggregate amount of income that is not subject to the FICA tax because of the income cap; and I do not have access to the formula by which Social Security determines benefit amounts for people. If I had some of this information, perhaps I would realize that my suggestions are not as sound as I believe them to be. So you can understand my frustration when those in power with access to the aforementioned information send me a form letter in answer to my queries and suggestions.

I am hoping that by writing you with my ideas that you will be able to have somebody in the government get back to me with a reasonable explanation that addresses my points of concern. So, here goes:

The first and probably most important thing we should do to protect the Social Security Trust Fund was proposed by Al Gore during the 2000 Presidential Race when he advocated putting the fund in a "LOCKBOX" to prevent the Federal Government from borrowing from the fund.

Then, in the spirit of fairness, lower the FICA tax, eliminate the income cap for the individual taxpayers, and maintain the income cap on the employer's contribution but raise that cap to offset the lower tax rate. In this way the majority of Americans would realize a tax cut which they could use to pay down their mortgages or invest into their retirement nest eggs, and all Americans would be paying the same tax rate on their total incomes. For example, let’s say that the 6.2% FICA tax rate is lowered by a third to 4.13%. Now an individual who earns $40,000 a year would pay $1,652 a year in FICA taxes rather than the current tax of $2,480 a year, thereby realizing a savings of $828 that could be put into a retirement account or used to pay down his/her mortgage.

If neither of those suggestions is viable, perhaps we should change the criteria or formula with regard to the amount of Social Security payments made to individuals upon their retirement (or receiving of disability) to more appropriately reflect the amount of their total lifetime income that was subject to the Social Security (FICA) tax. On the official Social Security Administration’s website at www.ssa.gov, there is a benefits calculator that estimates a person’s potential benefit amount using different retirement dates and levels of future earnings. Several months ago, using the SSA website’s Quick Calculator, I calculated the monthly benefit amount for two individuals, each of whom was born on the same date of 6/15/50, and each of whom plans to retire at age 68 in June of 2018. As a part of the calculation(s), I indicated that one of the individuals earned $40,000 in 2007, and that the other individual earned $1,000,000 in 2007. For both individuals, I selected the option to see their projected benefit amounts in inflated (future) dollars. The results were as follows:

Current earnings: $40,000.00 - Your estimated monthly benefit amount, beginning at age 68 in 2018, is $2,039.00.

Current earnings: $1,000,000.00 - Your estimated monthly benefit amount, beginning at age 68 in 2018, is $3,826.00. (Note: For your benefit calculation, we limited your earnings to the $102,000.00 taxable maximum for 2008.)

Based on the calculation results, a person who earns tens of millions of dollars in his lifetime can expect to receive 88% more in monthly Social Security retirement benefits than a person who just barely earns $1,000,000 in his lifetime. And that same multi-millionaire can expect to receive 252% more in monthly Social Security retirement benefits than a person who earns just the federal minimum wage during his lifetime! Now why would a retiree with more than enough income and resources to support an affluent lifestyle need to receive $46,000 a year from Social Security? Surely such an individual would not even blink if say, half of those Social Security benefits were re-directed to those persons who depend upon their monthly benefits to pay the rent, put food on the table and cover medical costs! After all, wasn't Social Security created as a safety net for the poorest of American Society?