| There are many Republicans that want to ‘save’ Social Security because they do not see the numbers adding up over the long-term and there are studies now that show in the mid to short-term, the program is in real trouble. Some conservatives are trying to come up with solutions that will limit expenses. |  |
 | The discussion here is ‘means testing.’ Means testing has genuine economic problems. Economics is the study of the change in peoples’ behavior concerning time, work and resources with changing circumstances. The significant circumstance change here is that if you save your money for your own retirement, you will also pay into the government system and not draw government benefits. |
| If you do not save personally, you will also pay into the government system, and you will draw government benefits. Instinctively, people will not save for their retirement or have the motivation to hide their wealth. This simple fact of dynamic changes in people's behavior is lost to many, and they statically do the math as if people will still endure greater sacrifice in their working years and end up receiving roughly the same funds a month as the person that did not sacrifice. |  |
 | The person that saved would be drawing from their private retirement funds and means-tested out of receiving Social Security. The person who does not have any private funds would receive their money from Social Security. This also will create high incentives for people to hide their money from the government to not be means tested out of the system. |
