S. retirement check. While being a solution to the crisis, the political process to bring about these cuts would never "get off the ground", because today in America, the most powerful and influential lobby is the American Association of Retired Persons. So large is this lobby (approx. 34 million members) that it wields the power to sway politicians into supporting its beliefs (Cowan 604-06). Seniors want their benefits, and with the support and numbers they can muster, cutting their benefits seems almost an arduous task without some kind of compromise between the A.A.R.P. and our government officials. .
Unfortunately as of now the burden of economically supporting senior programs falls heavily on the shoulders of those workers or students who were born after 1960. .
Past generations have led us to believe that the current workforce will support senior programs but many problems have arisen today that previous generations didn't have to cope with. For instance between the years of 2010-2025 the number of American Workers will increase 9 million. The senior population however, is expected to grow by 22 million. During the 60's, when benefit programs such as Social Security and Medicare were created, the workforce doubled the amount of retirees (Cowan, 608-10). Regrettably, today our nation doesn't share that luxury. Our workforce including those still enrolled in college will on average have to work longer hours to receive the same income (inflation calculated) as their predecessors not because of lower wages or unemployment but because of the sharply raised payroll tax. Lowered incomes will lead to an inferior quality of life. Workers must fight for their rights as well but getting any political representation will be challenging. Slim may be the word to best describe the worker's chance of receiving political support because of their lack of national unity. Our government officials seeing the brewing crisis should try to prevent this disaster.
