(NewsNation) — A Republican committee proposed a budget that would increase the retirement age to account for longer life expectancy.
It would also “limit and phase out” auxiliary benefits for high-income earners.
“With insolvency approaching in the 10-year budget window, Congress has a moral and practical obligation to address the problems with Social Security,” the budget proposal read.
Financial adviser Rebecca Walser says people need to understand that when Social Security was first passed into law in 1935, the expected mortality for men was 62.
“They set the retirement age at 65, knowing full well that most men wouldn’t get it at all, and that women would get it for a few months,” she said.
Now, though, people are living longer. Life expectancy for the U.S. population was 77.5 in 2022, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“So really, the program is paying people for two decades when it didn’t anticipate mathematically paying them for that long,” Walser said. “It’s worked so far, because we haven’t had an entire generation on the program. But as the baby boomers retire en mass onto the program, this is when we’re starting to, for the first time, really see the financial deficiencies.”
Watch the full interview in the video player above.
NewsNation digital reporter Katie Smith contributed to this report.