Senators are considering raising the retirement age to 70

You seem to have misunderstood the topic of the article that I trust you read.

The article seems to be about US senators, and I think most people would agree that they should retire earlier, not later.

Senators and their peers don't rely on Social Security for most of their retirement income, so they are fairly well insulated from any change to Social Security benefits even without any explicit carve-out.

Probably not. Mandarory retirement in general was made illegal, and anyway, the requirements for Senate office holders are in the constitution and don't have a maximum age. Could be an amendment though; or perhaps a Senate rule.

https://www.eeoc.gov/statutes/age-discrimination-employment-...

perhaps evidence of past election results reinforce this

They started taxing social security as a way to reduce it without seeming like they were.

Social security is going to run out of money soon.

It's tragic that we cannot seem to agree that it needs to be fixed, nevermind how to fix it.

I'm not trying to start a flamewar. But this seems like a flaw in democracy. Why aren't we angry and upset? Why is the public so passive?

I like democracy, but maybe I have failed to understand that it is just a projection of regular human flaws. As individuals, we are poor at planning long term. Maybe that applies to groups also.

> Government wants people to work till 70

No, A mostly-Republican group within government wants people to need to work until they die. Cutting Social Security benefits (which is what the “full retirement age” shift is about) and the other things discussed in the article are just what they think they might be able to get away with politically at the moment using the idea that they are “protecting” Social Security by addressing it’s fiscal health.

Many other segments of the population also get much less work than they would be willing to accept. Time to cut the standard working week ?

Does that help if you have to also pay more benefits out?

What are you talking about? The article is about raising the vesting age.

And it's not about "employees".

This is about the (us) social security 'full retirement age', which is the age at which the baseline benefits calculation are set; take benefits earlier and get less per year, take benefits later and get more per year.

It's probably a sensible change, but old people vote, so good luck senators. Best to phase that in over a long period. Maybe work on making the actuarial tables closer to reality as well.

Um, most people have not vested already. Most people don't have vesting involved in their income at all, at any point in their lives.

For people who do have 401(k)s and similar, the "retirement" age determines when you can start withdrawing from your retirement funds without suffering significant tax penalties.

This is of course assuming you can save enough in your 401(k) (or similar) to retire given the anemic limits on savings that are - as usual for things that benefit tax payers rather than billionaires and corporations - not tied to inflation.

> Gov wants to hold their eymployee pensions until 70?

No, they want to shift to the “full retirement age” (which is, oddly, not when maximum benefits apply) up to 70 – and consequently, reduce benefits at all ages – for Social Security, the public, almost-universal safety-net retirement program.