Dems want to raise Social Security taxes

Opinion Journal:

Social Security was supposed to be a killer issue for Democrats this election year after they defeated President Bush's reform plans in 2005. But suddenly the tables are turning on several Democratic candidates because of their endorsement of the tax-increase agenda of the American Association of Retired Persons, or AARP.

The liberal entitlement lobby has asked candidates around the country to fill out a questionnaire asking, "Will you support a balanced Social Security plan to continue the program's guaranteed benefits for future generations?" That may sound innocuous, but here's how AARP defines its balanced plan on its Web site near the above question: "AARP believes that a bipartisan plan that balances additional contributions from high income workers with modest adjustments in future benefits can maintain guaranteed Social Security benefits for future generations."

Those italics are ours, because in Washington "additional contributions" means a tax increase. And by "high income workers," AARP can only mean anyone earning more than $94,200, which is the 2006 income level above which the 12.4% Social Security portion of the payroll tax no longer applies. Employers and workers each pay half of the payroll levy, and the income cap already rises each year with inflation.

Thus if you make, say, $100,000 a year but live in pricey Los Angeles, tough luck; the folks at AARP think you're rich. They supported the elimination of the income cap for Medicare's portion of the payroll tax (2.9%) as part of the Clinton 1993 tax increase, and now they want to do it for the other 12.4%. A worker earning $150,000 would pay roughly $6,900 more each year in "additional contributions" under this AARP definition of "balance."

Many members in both parties signed this pledge, but for a handful of Democrats in hotly contested House seats (see the table nearby) it's become a political liability. That's because their GOP opponents refused to take the AARP pledge and are making an issue of this Democratic support for raising taxes on middle- and upper-income wage earners. It's certainly information voters ought to have before next Tuesday. Strangely, however, the Democrats are crying foul, and AARP is trying to give them political cover.

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This has been the Democrat plan all along for handling Social Security. Their fight against reform was meant to leave us with no alternative but to raise taxes. This regressive approach to solving the Social Security ponzi scheme only makes it worse. They opposed making it sound the same way they wrongfully opposed welfare reform.