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Government abuse hurts Social Security
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Editor:
    I retired at 68, after 50 years of work, and am now 70 and healthy. Without apologies to Mr. Phil Boyum I plan to stay alive and in receipt of my hard earned Social Security pension for as long as possible.
    Mr. Boyum explains (in his column of May 9) that the solution to the S.S. funding problem is to draft retirees into ‘fulfilling” work in “child care centers” (!) and [self defeating] government subsidized employer positions. Perhaps he should also consider for his motto “Arbeit macht frei” as favored by an earlier fulfilling labor advocate.
    As an alternative, he could identify the real reason why SocSec. is in such poor state, and place the responsibility for correcting the situation onto the culprit rather than the victim. He could, for instance, suggest that the culprit a.) stop pilfering the annual social security surplus and b.) start repaying the money already taken by it and previous governments. In 2006 alone, the Bush administration skimmed off over $80 billion in surplus payments. Had the original intention of reinvesting the surplus been maintained, Americans could look forward to a substantially greater retirement pension for life without costing the government a cent.
    Instead the surplus has become an annual government bonus, spent on who knows what by who knows who?  An honest government (I know it’s an oxymoron) would at least refund the overpayment to the taxpayer, particularly as it is a double tax, being applied after deduction of income taxes.  
    It’s a pity that Mr. Boyum would rather penalize the people that have built his society, fought his wars, paid for his schools and continue to pay for his children’s schools, rather than support the rights of these now vulnerable folk.
Ken Sheridan
Statesboro
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