Reflections on the Debate (Philadelphia)- no. 4


Thanks to Tim Russert's questioning at the Democratic debate on 10/31/07 at Drexel University, we now have a fairly good idea what the three leading candidates for the Democratic nomination for President believe about one of the most viable options for reforming Social Security. Asked about raising the cap from $97,500, Senator Clinton stated


So when somebody asks me, would something like this be considered, well, anything could be considered when we get to a bipartisan commission. But personally, I am not going to be advocating any specific fix until I am seriously approaching fiscal responsibility.

Thus, the frontrunner's response: maybe, assuming I get political cover. Later in the same discussion, Senator Obama explained:

So what I’ve said, and I know some others on this stage have said, is that among the options that are available, the best one is to lift the cap on the payroll tax, potentially exempting folks in the middle— middle class folks— but making sure that the wealthy are paying more of their fair share—a little bit more.

Thus, the response from the guy in second place: sounds like a good idea.

We already had heard from the guy in third place. Edwards has advocated the approach Obama describes as "exempting folks in the middle- middle class folks." To be sure, individuals earning more than $97,500 annually are in most states upper middle class, but there may be some policy value exempting those earning say, $150,000 a year, aside from the obvious advantage of political viability. And of course, the idea that someone accruing a half million, or a million, dollars a year should have to pay more to help the elderly in itself is anathema to most professional Repubs, who by their support for a cap demonstrate a belief that wages earned by middle class workers are somehow tainted.