The Coming Generational Storm

Book excerpt: AS URGENT AS EVER: Nonpartisan policy recommendations and personal strategies for protecting against skyrocketing tax rates, reduced benefits, high inflation, and ruined currency. “Lays out in easy-to-understand prose why Social Security and Medicare need a comprehensive overhaul.” —Los Angeles Times In 2030, as 77 million baby boomers hobble into old age, walkers will outnumber strollers; there will be twice as many retirees as there are today but only 18% more workers. How will America handle this demographic overload? How will Social Security and Medicare function with fewer working taxpayers to support these programs? According to Laurence Kotlikoff and Scott Burns, we’ll see skyrocketing tax rates, drastically lower retirement and health benefits, high inflation, a rapidly depreciating dollar, unemployment, and political instability. But to solve a problem you must first understand it. Kotlikoff and Burns take us on a guided tour of our generational imbalance, first introducing us to the baby boomers and the “fiscal child abuse” that will double the taxes paid by the next generation. There’s also the “deficit delusion” of the under-reported national debt. None of this will be solved by any of the popularly touted remedies: cutting taxes, technological progress, immigration, foreign investment, or the elimination of wasteful government spending. So, how can the United States avoid this demographic/fiscal collision? Kotlikoff and Burns propose bold new policies, including meaningful reforms of Social Security and Medicare. Their proposals are simple, straightforward, and geared to attract support from both political parties. Kotlikoff and Burns also offer a “life jacket”—guidelines for individuals to protect their financial health and retirement. This paperback edition has been revised and updated and includes a new foreword by the authors.