The 2024 election season, more than any in recent memory, has been defined by fear — of immigration, of crime, of autocracy, of our fellow Americans. It’s a powerful emotion, and one that quickly overwhelms reason. Fear makes it more difficult to assess difficult situations and come to rational conclusions.

In the race for U.S. Senator in Pennsylvania, one vintage issue has become the subject of fearmongering from both sides — an issue of particular political relevance in Western Pennsylvania, which remains one of the oldest regions of America. And that’s Social Security.

Ads from a super PAC supporting Republican David McCormick and directly from the campaign of Democratic incumbent Sen. Bob Casey have made misleading or downright false claims about their opponent’s designs on the Social Security system, raising unnecessary fears about the availability of benefits for today’s retirees, or soon-to-be retirees.

What makes this particularly damaging, however, is that Social Security really does face serious struggles, which will require hard decisions in the near future. And those decisions will be all the more difficult if they must be made in an atmosphere of fear and suspicion, rather than collaboration for the common good — especially when that good requires sacrifices.

TARGETING IMMIGRANTS

An ad from a Republican-aligned super PAC attacks Casey’s immigration record, and ties it to Social Security. The ad alleges that Casey supports “amnesty” for undocumented immigrants, which means “giving your benefits” — including Social Security — “to illegals.”

The purpose of the spot is clear enough: to suggest that the third-term senator supports removing benefits from native-born Americans in favor of giving them to new Americans who have had their immigration status regularized.

The problem is that the ad rests on the assumption that Social Security is a stable pot of money, and that benefits delivered to one person necessarily means they won’t be available for someone else. But this fundamentally misunderstands how Social Security works. In fact, it’s likely that immigration actually bolsters Social Security, rather than draining it.

That’s because new Americans don’t just derive benefits from the system: They pay into it.

The overall effect of immigration on U.S. entitlement programs is hard to calculate because it depends on the demographics of the migrants themselves, which changes over time. Steve Robinson, chief economist for the Concord Coalition, which advocates for lowering the federal debt, wrote in June that “available evidence suggests the net effect [of immigration] is more likely positive than negative, but in either case, immigration will neither save [Social Security and Medicare] nor precipitate their demise.”

In other words, scaring voters about threats to entitlement programs from immigrants who pay into the system doesn’t make sense.

FALSE FEARMONGERING

While this form of Social Security fearmongering depends on economic analysis, Casey’s attack on McCormick is a simple and direct fabrication. In a television advertisement, Casey himself states that McCormick has “made clear he’ll slash your Medicare and Social Security and cut Medicaid for nursing home care.” The problem, according to a robust fact-check by the Washington Post, is that the Republican candidate has never said any such thing.

The justification for Casey’s claim is a report from what the Washington Post calls a “liberal dark money group” that argues that extending former President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts would be tantamount to slashing entitlements, because it would balloon the federal deficit.

But if proposing policies that increase the deficit means committing to “slashing Social Security” and other entitlements, then nearly every federal lawmaker is guilty — including, of course, Casey. While Trump’s brazen tax-cutting proposals would add more to the deficit than Vice President Kamala Harris’s proposals, both campaigns are attempting to appeal to voters with policies that throw fiscal caution to the wind.

The truth is that McCormick has never said or even hinted at what Casey is claiming in this shameless ad. Besides misleading the electorate, these tactics also make it harder to do what actually has to be done: reforming Social Security.

REAL SOLUTIONS

While both parties try to convince voters that Social Security is under threat from the other side, the truth is that the national retirement system’s biggest challenge is its own design. As people generally live longer, and fewer young people enter the workforce, within a decade Social Security is projected to be insolvent.

In 2009, the costs of Social Security surpassed the revenues from the payroll tax, and in 2033 the Social Security trust fund will be exhausted. Fortunately there are solutions — but they’ll require clear heads and honest collaboration to bring to pass.

For instance, currently payroll taxes — 6.2% paid each by the employer and the employee — are only levied on the first $168,600 of wages. As wages and inflation increase, over time this tax captures a smaller percent of overall income. Increasing the cap would be a small sacrifice that will ensure the system remains in place when today’s young wage-earners approach retirement.

It has also been more than 40 years since the Social Security retirement age has been adjusted. In that time, life expectancy has increased (depending on which measurement you use) by three to five years. Even a modest increase of the full retirement age, from 67 to 68, would significantly decrease the strain on the system.

These two reforms — nothing radical, just commonsense adjustments to the system — would put Social Security on a secure footing for decades to come. But consistent fearmongering about non-threats to the system will only make it more difficult to address the real ones.

— Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via TNS