Wretchard:

I am sure someone here will correct me if I am wrong, but wasn’t the original social security retirment age set above the average life expectancy? I believe it was 65 before you got anything and most people were considered lucky to make it that far. (Remembering this was the age before modern medicine – plenty of people lived to be very old indeed, but on average not too many lived past 70 – and so could be counted on not to collect too much from the government.)

Now, if the age of collecting social security is raised (as I fully expect it will be) to 75 or perhaps even 80 that would indeed take a lot of the strain off the system – but only if people were not allowed to retire earlier and get partial payments. Of course, all this is predicated on the need for people to die and not burden the government. That being the case, why not encourage smoking, drinking and other life-shortening habits? Perhaps I should not be giving our political masters ideas.