rescueme
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
+1...You didn't pay for it, the next generation is paying for it. Seems like a lot of people don't realize that. SS and Medicare for you are paid for by the generation after you, not funded by your own money. The kids are always paying for the parents.
I continue to be amazed that most folks don't recognize this simple fact.
"On January 31, 1940, the first monthly retirement check was issued to Ida May Fuller of Ludlow, Vermont, in the amount of $22.54. Miss Fuller, a Legal Secretary, retired in November 1939. She started collecting benefits in January 1940 at age 65 and lived to be 100 years old, dying in 1975."
She certainly did not contribute to her own benefit. Another generation (or two) did over her retirement years, and that continues to this day.
Heck, DW/me went through several "revisions" of these programs, both in increase of taxes, amount of income taxed, along with the increase in full retirement benefit age and the reduction in age 62 SS benefits.
Sure, "the kids" will have to contribute more over time. That's the way it's always been. They are younger, will probably make more than us over time, and will live longer (along with a longer period of contributions).
We "kids" had to make adjustments over time, during our wo*king years. Ours will have to do the same. Nothing new under the sun...