Your Opinion: Demographics and the national debt

Dear Editor:

A recent AP article noted that the economy will "slam into a demographic wall" as the "vast baby boom generation" retires. I thought it would be a great for all us "old rich people" to retire. We still spend money and by retiring we open up jobs for younger people.

Over 14 million people have turned 65 since the beginning of 2010. If all of them were working and retired at 65, it would have created over 14.6 million job openings in just the past four years.

Democrats say that it is a good thing that Obamacare is going to reduce the number of those who work by over 2 million people. Why is it anything other than fantastic that retirement does the same?

The comment that "government is going to have to have to borrow more, raise taxes or cut spending to support Social Security,"makes my blood boil. If government does nothing Social Security is fully solvent until well into the 2030s.

At that time, again if government does nothing, benefits will drop to 75 percent of current levels. The actual problem is that government has a huge spending/borrowing problem. It has borrowed over $3 trillion of our Social Security taxes and blown them on who knows what.

Government "slashed spending and raised taxes in 2013." I agree that government raised taxes. Revenues hit an all-time high in 2013. Slashed spending? Federal spending was 2.3 percent ($84 billion) less in 2013 than it was in 2012. Winding down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan should easily account for that small reduction.

The only substantial gain from the "War on Poverty" is the number of people with their hands out.

A recent Your Opinion piece noted that our national debt is not a problem because government can just keep borrowing and printing money. Paying interest on borrowed money is about the same as throwing the money in the stove.

Using the writers 2.7 percent interest rate, in 2000 the debt was $5.63 trillion, annual interest $152 billion ($540/citizen.) Currently the debt is over $17 trillion, interest $460 billion ($1,375/citizen). In 2014 the government has to suck an additional $875 out of every citizen just to break even.

Every person in every future generation will pay more in taxes because of this interest.