tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5465015914589377788.post7781560935266908117..comments2024-03-20T09:32:16.592-04:00Comments on Michael James on Money: OAS Age Change DebateMichael Jameshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10362529610470788243noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5465015914589377788.post-61375381991754338342012-04-10T20:46:15.564-04:002012-04-10T20:46:15.564-04:00Switching to a fixed percentage of life expectancy...Switching to a fixed percentage of life expectancy makes sense. It would hopefully avoid having to constantly revisit the same issue (at least the age part).WhereDoesAllMyMoneyGo.comhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185007666460707356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5465015914589377788.post-41796965133147506292012-04-10T14:07:01.562-04:002012-04-10T14:07:01.562-04:00@Matt: Nice soylent green reference. I agree tha...@Matt: Nice soylent green reference. I agree that it would be better to make the age change immediately, but that would be political suicide.<br /><br />@Preet: I agree with you that most of the OAS increase is temporary, but it will rise again when the echo generation hits retirement. The baby boomers make the problem look worse than it is. However, a fraction of the increase is permanent due to rising life expectancy. I'd like to see the OAS age be periodically reset to some fixed percentage of life expectancy (like 85%) and then each generation can debate what level of payments make sense. As for clawback, I wouldn't be opposed to reducing the income at which clawback begins, but I feel much more strongly that we can't have people thinking that it is their right to be taken care of by young workers during a ridiculously long retirement.Michael Jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10362529610470788243noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5465015914589377788.post-66942814161246761642012-04-10T13:55:19.343-04:002012-04-10T13:55:19.343-04:00You don't want to pick on me, yet you pick on ...You don't want to pick on me, yet you pick on me. What are you, a politician all of a sudden? :)<br /><br />I appreciate your comments as always.<br /><br />While my Globe and Mail columns are limited in terms of space allotted and I don't get to say everything I would like, you make an excellent point that just by living longer one would collect more benefit. <br /><br />And while perhaps the increase in costs relative to GDP could be considered whopping, regardless, that increase should only be temporary. If there is an increase in OAS payments relative to GDP based on demographics, then presumably the decrease in education costs would partially offset that anyway. But this is making a big assumption that nothing is going to change between now and then and just projecting tax rates, credits, and current relative budgets forward in time. <br /><br />After the boomer cohort has come and gone, the cost relative to GDP should go back down. So, raising the age based on sustainability is a permanent solution to a temporary problem - again, if sustainability is the issue.<br /><br />I do think making the change upwards in age is fine for other reasons, but I've also said elsewhere that if they are going to make changes, I'd like to see an analysis of the effect of reducing the clawback threshold. Currently, clawback doesn't begin until one's income is about $70K.<br /><br />I'm not sure why we need to pay welfare to those who don't need it.<br /><br />See you in a few weeks!WhereDoesAllMyMoneyGo.comhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09185007666460707356noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5465015914589377788.post-83856506938673774622012-04-10T10:39:28.634-04:002012-04-10T10:39:28.634-04:00From the hysterics we're hearing from the old ...From the hysterics we're hearing from the old people lobby, you'd think the government had announced that we were going to start making them into soylent green.<br /><br />Speaking as a member of the generation that's being saddled with the boomer's debt, the only thing wrong with the increase in OAS age is that it's not being done today.mattnoreply@blogger.com