The graying of the American workforce continues: Baby boomers are working longer and earning more than their predecessors did in what Americans typically think of as retirement years, new research finds.
Almost 20% of Americans ages 65 and older were employed this year, according to a new report from Pew Research Center. That’s nearly double the share of those who were working 35 years ago. In total, there are around 11 million Americans 65 or older who are working today, comprising 7% of all wages and salaries paid by U.S. employers. In 1987, they made up 2%.
And not only are more Americans at or above the traditional retirement age of 65 working, but they are also earning substantially more compared with what older workers earned in the 1980s. Now, the typical older worker earns $22 per hour, compared with $13 per hour then. Their wage growth—some of which can be attributed to their working longer hours than older Americans did in the past—has outpaced that of workers ages 25 to 64 over the same time period, according to Pew’s research, which is based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey and the Federal Reserve’s 2022 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking.
Okay. I’ll bite. Source?
I’ll need you to disprove this:
Yes, the money that Social Security pays out in benefits is primarily funded by people who are currently paying into the system. Social Security operates on a pay-as-you-go basis, meaning the payroll taxes collected from current workers and their employers are used to pay the benefits to current retirees, as well as to other beneficiaries like disabled workers and survivors of deceased workers. This system is different from a fully funded pension system, where the contributions are invested and saved to fund the individual’s own future benefits. In the Social Security system, today’s workers are not accumulating a personal fund, but rather are funding the benefits for current beneficiaries, with the expectation that future workers will do the same for them when they retire. It’s important to note that Social Security also receives income from the taxation of benefits and has trust funds that can be used to pay benefits. However, the primary source of funding is the payroll taxes from current workers.
