The Iowa 2008 blog is a companion to AARP Iowa's Voices for the Future. Conversations reported here are the views of attendees and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of AARP. AARP is a nonprofit, nonpartisan membership organization that does not endorse any candidates nor make contributions to political parties or candidates.
Washington, Iowa
Retired health care workers, nursing home administrators, farmers and other retired individuals made up the conversation at the ISU Extension Office at the Washington County Fairgrounds.
The group had a great deal to say about the Social Security system. A couple of participants said that they would prefer to take the money that is being put in Social Security and invest it themselves. The whole group acknowledged that this approach would not work for everyone and Social Security should be kept intact as a safety net for citizens. A couple of ideas brought up to help fix the system included: lifting the cap, encourage people to work longer, invest money in the system to make it grow more quickly and not allowing other programs to borrow from the system.
Should we try to keep the elderly in their homes longer to save the government Medicare money?
Is there a perfect fix for these systems that will satisfy everyone?
