Public Skeptical of Raising Age for Retirement

As the Clinton administration gears up for a special White House conference on Social Security, the head of the huge retirement program warned Tuesday that the public is deeply skeptical of any proposal to raise the retirement age.

Boosting the age for full Social Security benefits to 70 has become a component of many congressional proposals for saving the program from bankruptcy in the next century. But Social Security Commissioner Kenneth Apfel said there is “very little support among the American people” for increasing the age, which is 65 and already scheduled to rise in stages to 67 for Americans born after 1959.

In fact, Apfel said, “I don’t like that idea” is the most common popular response to virtually all suggestions for solving Social Security’s financial problems. But now, with the government running its first budget surpluses in a generation, is the time to act, he declared.

Apfel’s remarks about a skeptical public underscore the major difficulties President Clinton and Congress will encounter in trying to find common ground at next week’s two-day White House conference on Social Security.

Republicans continue to insist that only a specific proposal by Clinton can start the ball rolling. Apfel’s address at the National Press Club “was an eloquent speech that could have been given by any Democrat or any Republican--the only thing missing was a plan,” said Ari Fleischer, spokesman for the House Ways and Means Committee.

The White House has refused to offer any detailed plan other than to repeat the slogan Clinton offered in January’s State of the Union address, “Save Social Security First.”

However, despite the lack of consensus, Congress and the president must strive to reach agreement on keeping Social Security sound for the retirement of the baby boomers and succeeding generations, Apfel said.

“We can’t wait because for the first time in a generation our fiscal position enables us to take action,” Apfel remarked. “The nation enjoys a budget surplus for the first time in my adult life,” said the commissioner, who turned 50 in October and joined the American Assn. of Retired Persons, or AARP.

The political challenge, said Apfel, is finding a solution to a problem that represents “thunder in the distance” rather than an immediate crisis.

The danger date for Social Security is 2032, when its trust funds will be exhausted and the payroll tax revenues collected from workers will be sufficient to pay “only about three-fourths of benefits due” under current law, Apfel said. The political task is filling the 25% gap without resorting to major tax increases or benefit cuts.