Social security to be whittled down from the top - brainwashing has begun via media [View all]

Last edited Sun Apr 19, 2026, 07:30 AM - Edit history (1)

Many articles have appeared touting the benefit fo a ‘six figure cap’ to social security.
The articles all focus on hypothetical couples receiving $100,000 per year in social security benefits. They are appearing in a rash of magazines like measles in South Carolina.
The articles initially didn’t mention singles receiving $50,000. They did not detail if the proposed caps would rise with inflation, or stay constant. They didn’t mention the rising cost of Medicare.

It’s always been the ‘third rail’ but they've figured out a way to sell us down the river. Start with ‘six figure incomes’ and articles about ‘how much does so-and-so celebrity get in social security’. No one feels sorry for 6-figure income earners in an economy that isn’t paying well for new hires.

But yes, they are proposing a cap of $50K for singles, too. And in the more detailed proposals out of the right wing groups proposing it, it is clear that a vast swath will eventually be affected.

Funny that they are not proposing a cap on Medicare payment increases. So a $50K cap might be accompanied by a $5K or $10K mandatory Medicare expense. You don’t have a choice about taking or not taking Medicare, after all.

The $50K cap is reduced by the same percentage per year before Full Retirement Age (FRA) that benefits do. So those who draw social security at 62 would be capped at 70% of $50K = $35K. I believe that an ex-wife filing on such a record might be capped at $17,500??

Footnotes are interesting:
4 The same cap would also apply to disability benefits. Although not detailed in this paper, special caps could be set for certain types of auxiliary benefits. For example, widow(er) benefits could be limited to $75,000 (halfway between the single and couple cap) and/or a secondary $87,500 cap could be applied on top of existing “family maximums,” mimicking the existing family maximum at 175% of the primary worker's PIA for high earners.

I shared this story with family members, and reactions were ‘well, we have to do something’ and ‘I don’t think we can afford to give $100K to anyone or have cost of living increases when the system is broke’.

Congratulations, right wing think tanks. Looks like you’ve managed to neuter the third rail. We are so screwed.

As a side note, i don’t need to tell politics-savvy DU members this, but this seems once again to target the educated professional salaried class in general — i.e., those in the big cities — and also two-professional couples. (On edit: I removed comments about the impact of marriage on this, because I had some wrong assumptions. I still think the 2-professional couples are likely to be more negatively impacted by this, but it’s more complicated.)