SS plan- Only take what you need

To the editor:

Several years ago the CEO of a large American company was going through a divorce. As is common, the financial assets of this multimillionaire were published. One of the items that caught my attention was the listing that detailed his Social Security income, a penny in a pile of gold.

The phrase "compact between generations" has crept into our dialogue over the issue of Social Security as a way of ennobling and defending the entitlement. A compact requires an exchange of something of value between parties. The current system is simply a one-way transfer of wealth from young to old. The only compact in this arrangement is that of the current politicians telling the young that if they continue to pay the old, then someday, someone will do the same for them.

We are at a self-selected crossroads today with the current system. We can choose to make some unsettling but effective long-term changes to the structure now, or we can force catastrophic changes a few years in the future.

Why not rework the compact while we're at it? Perhaps wording something like this for the generations paying the bill: "We will provide for those in retirement to the extent that they cannot provide for themselves." And for the retirees: "We will ask from those behind us only that which we cannot ourselves provide." I really hope we can avoid the insanity of my grandchildren paying Bill Gates a retirement stipend.

BOB RATHBURN, Piedmont, Mo.