Helping All Understand Social Security

Social Security is not just an old people’s program,” says Social Security Commissioner Ken Apfel, “and changes to preserve it are not just a young people’s agenda.

“People of all ages need to come together in search of a common ground to make the future more secure.”

In a telephone interview, the commissioner said an inter-generational debate is what Tuesday’s White House Conference on Social Security is all about. The conference will be patched into Spokane via a satellite downlink at Gonzaga University’s teleconferencing center in the Foley Library, and area residents have been invited to participate in the forum.

Earlier last week, in an address to the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., Apfel said, “I have been impressed with the public’s understanding of just how important Social Security is — not only to older Americans — but to all Americans.

“They know what Social Security means for families, for people with disabilities, for children who have lost a parent. They know what it means to women, struggling to raise children alone or make ends meet in retirement.”

Such has not been my experience, however, as a columnist who writes about Social Security and many other retirement matters. A majority of people — most especially younger people — don’t know that Social Security pays survivor benefits to families when a breadwinner dies. Or that Social Security pays disability benefits when a worker is incapacitated.

In our interview, Apfel clarified his remarks to the national press corps. “I agree there are a lot of misconceptions out there about what Social Security is and does,” said the commissioner. “What I meant to convey is that most people believe in the importance of Social Security.

“Yes, there is a huge misconception that Social Security is a savings or investments vehicle — not a social insurance program. And, yes, there are ramifications of which people are partly or completely unaware.

“But, what I pick up all across the country,” Apfel emphasized, “is that people believe in the program.”

Maybe.

But younger people, by and large, are not eager to join with seniors in learning the facts or hashing over the problems. They stay away from forums on Social Security in droves. Everyone I have ever talked with in the Social Security Administration laments the disinterest and the lack of knowledge exhibited by younger people.

Next Tuesday’s teleconference may be different. It will be on a college campus, and, hopefully, more younger people will be attracted by the bells and whistles of a satellite downlink. That could be a little bit scary for some older folk.

“Our goal in these forums is to start the process of finding a common ground,” said Apfel. “The president is deeply committed to resolving the issue of how to make Social Security more secure next year.

“One of the greatest challenges is to draw younger people into the debate,” Apfel said. “For too many of them, retirement is too far off in the distance to take too seriously.

“Meantime, the disability benefits and the survivor benefits are there for the young people today if they need them, whether they know about them yet or not.

“Baby Boomers, on the other hand,” he said, “increasingly are getting involved in the issue. Collectively, they are starting to realize that they are going to retire in 10 or 15 years, and it’s dawning on them that they have not saved enough money and they will need Social Security.”

Ironically, older people — those already retired and approaching retirement, the very ones who pack most meetings — have the least cause for alarm. But fear runs high that anti-entitlements extremists in Congress and Wall Street spinmeisters clamoring for privatization will find a way to snatch away benefits old folks bought and already paid for over the decades.

The odds of that occurring would seem to be next to zero. As Apfel says, “Older people should not worry about it.

“But,” he urges, “everybody of all ages should show up for the debate.”