ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, December 22, 1994                   TAG: 9412220084
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SHARRELL FOWLER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SOCIAL SECURITY NEEDS A REAL FIX

WHEN I think of our current Social Security system, I'm reminded of that old chestnut, the pyramid scam. In a pyramid scam, those who get in at the start - that is, those on top of the pyramid - do quite well. As long as there are enough people paying in, those who come in later likewise get repaid for their initial investment.

The problem develops when the pyramid broadens out and has to start paying more and more people. This problem is compounded when fewer and fewer people are paying in. Eventually, there aren't enough people paying in and those at the bottom of the pyramid end up having made investments upon which they receive no return.

The current Social Security retirement system works in the same fashion -though, admittedly, over a much longer period of time: It plays out over generations. Current projections indicate that the Social Security retirement pyramid will break down in the year 2013. Those who have been paying in all our lives are in for the scamming of our lives when we expect to be repaid. While those who got in early - our parents and grandparents - have gotten back more than they invested, those who got in later can expect to have only a portion of their investment returned.

What could possibly have motivated our elected officials to devise such an obviously flawed system? (The fiscal problems to which I refer have been recognized for a long time. These were temporarily ``fixed'' a few years ago, without really addressing the long-term structural problems underlying the system.)

The reason for Congress' failure to address the issue is that our political class has found the pyramid scam to be a wonderful answer to politicians' main concern - getting re-elected. In the short run, if nobody raises the issue, serious questions about financing the program can be avoided. Thus, politicians don't have to risk their re-election chances, worrying their constituents with unpleasant matters such as long-term fiscal integrity of the Social Security system.

However, this short-term political vista does have long-term consequences for the electorate. In the long run, financial security of most Americans' retirement will be seriously damaged by short-term expediency exhibited by our political class. By the time the retirement system breaks down, politicians currently misgauging it will be comfortably retired on their own well-financed retirement plans. In the meantime, they can run for office, making promises for benefits they have no intention of adequately financing.

To protect our retirement, the public must recognize the nature of this scam, and insist that politicians adequately finance the Social Security program. Our choice is this: to continue to ask no questions and accept passively the situation as it unfolds, or to elect politicians who will tell us what we don't want to hear - that we'll have to raise taxes to finance this vital program.

This tax increase, coupled with reform of some of the benefits currently being promised (such as is being proposed by the president's bipartisan commission on entitlements and tax reform), would enable the system to operate as it was intended rather than as an election scam run by a group of clever con men posing as ``public servants.''

Sharrell Fowler of Galax serves as a family counselor in the Juvenile Court Services. 


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