Retirement planning should be the responsibility of the individual and family, not the federal government. Our national debt is huge, but unfunded liabilities that both federal and state governments own retired federal and state workers is 10 times larger! Yes, our liabilities are approaching 300 trillion dollars! Stacking 300 trillion one-dollar bills would go to the moon 75 times! The first step to regain any fiscal responsibility is to end Social Security. This will be painful, but Social Security should be replaced with individual retirement plans similar to 401K solutions offered by businesses. How did we get in this fiscal mess of 300 trillion dollars?

In Steward Machine Company v. Davis (1937), The Supreme Court (SCOTUS) upheld the unemployment compensation provision of the 1935 Social Security Act. In Steward, SCOTUS used a broad interpretation of federal government powers using the spending and general welfare clause. Both the Social Security Act and the unemployment provision, as was every entitlement act to follow in American history, was a coercive use of government power. For instance, if states opted out of entitlement laws, then they could never recoup the federal tax monies paid by its constituents. In Steward, Justice Benjamin Cardozo wrote, “the petitioner confuses motive with coercion” since “the states are at liberty, upon obtaining the consent of Congress, to make agreements with one another.” That may be true, but the federal government rarely takes advice from states, it only dictates terms. There is a fine line between motive and coercion.

SCOTUS also ruled that the Social Security Act was necessary and proper to promote the general welfare of the nation in response to the Great Depression (Helvering v. Davis). In his dissent, Justice James McReynolds wrote, “I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for making the federal government the great almoner of public charity throughout the United States.” Justice George Sutherland correctly predicted that “encroachments upon other functions, will follow.” He also added “Imposing a tax that could be avoided only by contributing to a state unemployment compensation fund was effectively coercing each state to make a law creating such a fund.” Steward marked the beginning of New Deal programs that were found constitutional using the spending clause to promote the general welfare of the nation. The precedent for this decision was established in United States v. Butler (1935). Although the Butler decision invalidated many provisions of FDR’s 1933 Agriculture Adjustment Act using the Tenth Amendment, for some reason SCOTUS felt compelled to provide an expansive interpretation of the spending clause as it pertains to the promotion of the general welfare of the nation. In fact, SCOTUS suggested Congress has powers not enumerated in the Constitution when using the spending clause.