Oooh, but if we lift the ceiling, then the Dems are once again evil tax-raisers.  And if we don't extend the tax cuts to the wealthy, then we're evil tax-raisers.

And we know how much Obama hates it when the other side call him names...he's already given in on the Bush tax cuts, so any moment now, he will have something mealy-mouthed to say about raising the cap on wages subject to SS tax.

The current funding system was developed at a time when America was on the gold standard. In that context it made sense that people had to save up money out of their own pockets in order to spend it later in their retirement.

But today in the absence of a gold standard this funding model is no longer needed. SS should just be funded out of general fiscal spending, with no special payroll taxes or what have you, because there is no need for the government to save money before it can spend it in a fiat currency system like today's. Furthermore, the taxes used to fund SS are thoroughly regressive because they fall only on the first $106k of income, as Sanders notes.

Just get rid of special SS-related taxes, fund it out of general spending, and implement a thoroughly progressive income tax system with no special deductions for rich people and their sources of income (so that Warren Buffet no longer pays less tax each year than his secretary).

I know my proposal has a snowball's chance in hell because it falls within a paradigm of government finance that no one in congress, let alone the neo-liberal Obama, agrees with or even understands. And even if the Democratic side of the aisle did comprehend and like it, the GOP never will and will most likely use a general-funding model as a means to destroy the program entirely the next time they are in office. So we are stuck with the current imperfect but nevertheless functional system.

The Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction plan is extremely disappointing and something that should be vigorously opposed by the American people. The huge increase in the national debt in recent years was caused by two unpaid wars, tax breaks for the wealthy, a Medicare prescription drug bill written by the pharmaceutical industry, and the Wall Street bailout. Unlike Social Security, none of these proposals were paid for. Not only has Social Security not contributed a dime to the deficit, it has a $2.6 trillion surplus.

"It is reprehensible to ask working people, including many who do physically-demanding labor, to work until they are 69 years of age. It also is totally impractical. As they compete for jobs with 25-year-olds, many older workers will go unemployed and have virtually no income. Frankly, there will not be too much demand within the construction industry for 69-year-old bricklayers. link

As the president has long stated, it is absurd that billionaires pay the same amount into the system as someone who earns $106,800.