(Spirit Lake)– A capacity crowd greeted U-S Senator Charles Grassley late Tuesday afternoon at the Spirit Lake Public Library.
Social Security reform was a main topic of discussion.
Grassley defended the need to reform the system, admitting he’s been drawing Social Security for four years now. Grassley says he got a good deal from the new deal of Franklin Roosevelt. But he says his grand child, Kerry Grassley, is going to have a “raw deal” if nothing is done, saying the cash flow in Social Security, if nothing is done, will only pay 73 percent of benefits by the time his grandchild is ready to draw from it.
Grassley also defended President Bush’s proposal to privatize Social Security by establishing personal investment accounts. But he says that won’t be enough on it’s own to stabilize the system. He recommends increasing social security taxes or removing a cap on them; changing the indexing formula by which the first retirement check is figured–presently, Grassley says they use the wage index to determine that and prior to 1977 the inflation index was used. He says the difference between those accounts for the shortfall Social Security faces if nothing is done. He also proposed increasing the retirement age.
Grassley says it will probably take a combination of all those items to get congress to act on a reform package.
