Initially, the age of 65 was selected for benefit payout because it was the then current life expectancy.

In effect, 1/2 of the employees paying into SS would die before ever seeing 1 penny of SS benefits.

Whereas today, the average life expectancy is ~75 years.

Adding “10″ years of payouts is a humongeous expense.
A very different program, than the 50 / 50 deal first envisioned.

SS should have set the retirement age at the life expectancy age. To be revised annually. The retirement age would have crept up, a month or two or so, per year, very understandably and very painlessly.

One way to get back to the life expectancy zone would be to reset it, today, to something like 75 years old. For practical reasons, current SS beneficaries should get the greatest breaks, especially the very oldest. And probably those very close to the current 65 year retirement ages. Their benefits should be delayed only by some few months. Maybe a sliding scale towards 18 years old would be the best and the fairest. In addition, the amount collected by SSI would be similarly adjusted, with the youngest getting the greatest reduction, since they would be paying for the longest time and receiving the least benefits over their lifetime.

In essence, SS tax rate and retirement age would be determined a person’s current age.

If possible, making the tax rate / retirement age selectible would be the best choice. Let employees decide how much they want to pay in SSI, based on the age at which they elect to receive benefits.

Seems having a mandatory minimum *private* plan would work the very simplest and best. Insurance / Annuity companies could easily handle the paperwork for different annual selections / total paid in very fairly and honestly, rather than having SS foul it up.