My premise is that Social Security should be transitioned into fully funded accounts because every working person deserves the dignity of using his/her own FICA taxes to accrue wealth for her/his retirement.
During that transition it makes sense to scale back promised benefits for higher paid workers as Kolbe-Stenholm suggest to remove some of the unfunded liability on younger workers. And because one cannot predict market returns over a short time it makes sense to keep a saftey net benefit based on the redefined Kolbe-Stenholm bend points but not less than the poverty level wage.
Over time, more and more of a worker's benefit would come from the Personal Retirment Account with younger workers having to provide only that portion of the "safety net" to arrive at the guaranteed benefit. When the Personal Retirement Account could fund the full benefit, then all of that unfunded liability is removed from the young workers.
Over a full working lifetime if a worker split her money between 60% stocks/40% bonds the market would have to lose 80% of its value on the day that worker retired for her to be worse off than under the current system.
Hence the safety net is a moot point- but can be there for the peace of mind of workers unfamiliar with private sector investing.
