Social Security has a safety-net component to its benefit structure. The safety-net component provides lifetime lower earners with a greater wage-replacement rate than higher earners receive. In this respect, Social Security's safety-net is a WELFARE program that protects lower earners by providing a "greater rate of return" than higher earners within the system receive. But even the higher earners may still only middle class persons struggling to get by.
My point in emphasizing the word "WELFARE" is not to denote disapproval of welfare. The point is that any WELFARE program should be paid for with progressive general taxes. Social Security violates this principle. Even higher earners in the Social Security system are still only middle class persons themselves. Persons with higher wage incomes (above the cap), or who have rental incomes, dividend incomes, royalty incomes, capital gains income, or any other kind of income are exempt from funding Social Security welfare for lower earners.
Question: Why should Social Security WELFARE not be funded by progressive general federal taxes?
