Five takeaways from POLITICO’s Finding Balance: What’s Next for Social Security

NEW YORK — Social Security could run out of money to pay out older adults in the next decade. It’s a serious issue, and while Pat Ryan and Andrew Garbarino — New York House members — emphasized that it needs a bipartisan solution, the Democrat and Republican disagreed about the right way to get there.

The New York Congress members were each interviewed at POLITICO’s Finding Balance: What’s Next for Social Security event Wednesday morning in Lower Manhattan.

Here are the top takeaways from the event:

Mandatory health care spending is up, and the number of older adults has grown. That growth means that the system may not have enough to provide full payments by 2035 — or even sooner, if costs rise, according to a POLITICO Pro data analysis .

“I think we need to have a candid honest conversation with the American people that the program needs structural reforms to be solvent,” Ryan, the Democrat, said.

And a solution needs to be done in a bipartisan way, Garbarino, the Republican, said.

“If it’s done by one party only, then the other party looks to take it back once they take over power,” he said. “That can’t happen here. Too many people rely on Medicare, too many people rely on Social Security for it to change every two years.”

The best way to get more money into Social Security, Ryan said, is by “making sure incredibly wealthy folks” — some of whom are right outside the door of the event on Wall Street, he joked — “pay their fair share.”

Currently, workers only pay into social security on annual wages up to $168,600 — anything above that isn’t taxed. Ryan said he disagreed with raising that threshold, arguing it would be “punitive to middle class, working people,” especially in higher cost areas of the country, like his Hudson Valley district. Ryan’s 18th Congressional District has a median income of just over $87,000.

“I would rather see us come at it top down,” Ryan added. “Start with the Jeff Bezoses of the world, and the Amazons of the world, that pay zero in corporate tax, that pay very little in income tax, and really think about how do we start there and work our way down, rather than raising that $168,000 level.”

Ryan teased that he’d be introducing legislation to address the issue soon. His office has scheduled a press conference in his district this Friday.

Garbarino pushed back on Ryan’s philosophy.

“Whenever anybody says pay their fair share, I ask ‘what does that mean?’ And ‘what would it be?’ And there’s never an answer. I think it’s just a political statement,” he said.

But Garbarino’s answer is just as politically divisive.

“Taxing people more is not the answer. Cutting discretionary funding is not the only answer,” he said. “There’s a lot of tough decisions that have to be made. And I think a fiscal commission might be the smartest way to do it.”

House Republicans have proposed a bipartisan commission that would address fiscal issues. But it’s received criticism from Democrats, who fear its impact on Social Security, as well as some pushback from fiscal conservatives who fear tax increases.

Multiple speakers stressed the difficulty of the issue, thanks, in part, to the political considerations of the difficult choices that may be necessary.

Democrats got slammed in the 2010 midterms after taking a big swing on the Affordable Care Act, which passed earlier that year, Jonathan Bowles with the economic think tank Center for an Urban Future said during a panel at the event.

“Will the next president want to take on something that results in tax increases or reduction benefits in their first term? I don’t think so,” Bowles said.

He did believe that Congress would act to keep Social Security solvent — it just might take the system going right up to the precipice before they act. “That’s the way that things get done,” Bowles said. But the constituency relying on Social Security is powerful. “Older adults vote, and I think there’s going to be a solution because politically, it’s just too difficult not to.”

Before diving into Social Security, Ryan praised Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a day after Vice President Kamala Harris chose him as her running mate. Ryan said he knew Walz a bit, as a fellow Army veteran.

Walz can speak to the economic divides in the country, Ryan said, and Republican criticisms of him as being too far left are “just intellectually lazy and not factually correct.”

Garbarino, speaking later, jumped on Walz, calling him an “ultra-liberal pick.”

“It was a gift to Republicans,” he added.