Retirement Reform Blog

The terms “filial responsibility” and “filial support” refer to an adult child’s obligation to render care to aging parents.  Before Medicare and Social Security, children were obliged to meet their filial responsibilities by filial support laws.  These laws gave children the primary responsibility in caring for elderly parents – neglecting to do so could yield financial consequences.

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Over the past several days, I have read some articles about the fact that next year's Social Security benefit payments will not be increasing as they normally do to keep up with inflation.  This is what is known as the cost of living adjustment (COLA).  According to some politicians and advocates, with rising health care costs, seniors are getting the short end of the stick unless an increase is in order.

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A recent New York Times article discusses whether the best time to retire is at 62 (early retirement) or at 70.  Its conclusion: hold out as long as you can.  This must, however, be taken with a grain of salt.  Getting the timing of retirement right depends on several factors, and no two families are exactly alike.

For a single person, probably the most important question is how long do you plan to live?  If you are "in poor health and probably won't live past 78," you might want to take benefits at early retirement, says the Times.  Ideally, if you expect to live a long time and can work past retirement, then 70 is the best time to take benefits.  

If long life is the expectation, but you can't work till 70, then 66 seems to be the magic number.  This option is best even if a retiree has to use retirement savings to make it to 66 to file for Social Security benefits.  That's because the increase in benefits gained by retiring at 66 instead of 62, eventually makes up for the savings used to make it to 66.  Waiting any longer than 66, seems to exhaust savings too much to make up for higher Social Security benefits.

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Fresh from the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a new survey found that many people plan on postponing retirement and working longer than they originally anticipated.  The reasons?  A bear market, economic worries, and less confidence in how much they have saved for retirement.

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In the spring, the Social Security Trustees released their annual report on the sad state of Social Security and Medicare.  To sum it up, both programs have a combined total of nearly $102 trillion in unfunded liabilities.  This means that we would need to have that much money in the bank today, earning interest, in order to pay Social Security and Medicare benefits to all current and future retirees into perpetuity.

But suppose both entitlement prograns ended tomorrow – no more payroll taxes collected, and no benefits paid to next generation retirees.  What would happen to that massive debt?  Not to ruin the holiday spirit, but according to NCPA Senior Fellows Andy Rettenmaier and Thomas Saving in their latest study, we would still owe our current retirees, baby boomers and younger workers who have accrued benefits a staggering $52 trillion!  Santa has a tall order to fill this year.