Saving Social Security | Matt for Utah

In about six years, Social Security’s retirement fund runs dry, and every retiree’s check gets cut by about a fifth. That cut happens automatically unless Congress acts. About 488,000 Utahns count on these checks today.

My plan closes the whole gap, under the assumptions explained below, with three simple ideas:

Everyone pays the same rate on every paycheck. Most workers get a tax cut.
A dollar is a dollar. High earners pay in on business and investment income, not just wages.
Fair benefits for the next generation. Those who gained the most give the most, and people with hard jobs are protected.

No one who is retired today loses a penny.

The problem

This year, for every dollar Social Security owes in benefits, it collects about 84 cents. For years the difference came out of savings built up in the 1980s. Those savings are nearly gone.

Three things got us here:

More retirees, fewer workers. Baby boomers are retiring, people live longer, and families are having fewer kids.
The cap. The tax stops at $184,500 of pay. A nurse pays on every dollar she earns. Someone making $1 million is done paying by early March.
Some income never pays in. Investment gains and some business profits skip the tax entirely, no matter how large.

Idea 1: The same rate on every paycheck

Today the Social Security tax is 12.4% of your pay, split between you and your employer, but it stops at $184,500. I’d replace that with one lower rate, about 11%, on every dollar of pay, with no cap.

If you earn less than about $206,000, you pay less than you do today. That’s more than 9 in 10 workers.
If you earn more, you pay the same rate as everyone else, instead of stopping partway through the year.

The chart shows the difference. Today the rate drops the more you earn. Under my plan it’s the same for everyone.

Calculated from the 2026 wage cap ($184,500), today's 12.4% combined rate, and a single flat rate of about 11% with no cap.

What it means for Utah

More than 9 in 10 Utah workers, about 1.7 million people, would get a tax cut, and so would the businesses that employ them.

If you earn	You keep each year	Your employer also saves
$40,000	about $260	about $260
$60,000	about $390	about $390
$100,000	about $650	about $650

Self-employed Utahns pay both halves, so they keep double. A small business with 20 employees averaging $50,000 a year would save about $6,500.

Idea 2: A dollar is a dollar

Right now, a teacher pays Social Security tax on every paycheck. Someone earning millions from selling stock pays nothing into the system. Some business owners avoid the tax by paying themselves a small salary and taking the rest as profit.

For households with income above $200,000 ($250,000 for couples), I’d have the rest of their income pay in too:

Business profits from work pay the same rate as a paycheck.
Investment income, such as stock gains, pays half that rate, because there’s no job behind it.

If you earn less than $200,000, nothing changes for you here. Retirement accounts like 401(k)s and IRAs are never touched, and neither is Social Security itself.

Idea 3: Fair benefits for the next generation

New taxes shouldn’t be the whole answer. For people now under 50, I’d make one change to future benefits, aimed at those who can best afford it:

Slower benefit growth at the top. Retirees with the highest lifetime earnings would still see their benefits keep up with prices, just not grow faster than that. Everyone else’s benefits are unchanged.

What I won’t do is raise the retirement age. Full retirement stays at 67. A roofer, a nurse’s aide, or a long-haul driver shouldn’t have to work until 70 because Washington put off this fix for decades.

And one change that helps: no one who worked a full career should retire into poverty. I’d guarantee a minimum benefit at least at the poverty line for anyone with 30 years of work. Rewarding a lifetime of work and caring for those who still come up short aren’t opposing values. They belong together.

How it adds up

Think of the shortfall as $100. Here’s roughly how much each idea closes.

Estimates built from the 2026 Trustees Report, SSA Chief Actuary estimates for similar provisions, and CRS and Tax Foundation data. Assumes high-end revenue and part of the 2025 Trustees Report outlook for births and immigration. Not an official score.

The biggest piece comes from Idea 2: income that pays nothing into Social Security today. One rate on every paycheck and slower benefit growth at the top do most of the rest, and a healthier outlook for births and immigration finishes the job.

The assumptions behind the numbers

Every estimate of a 75-year plan rests on assumptions. These numbers use two that are optimistic but realistic:

The plan raises and saves at the high end of the estimates. That means less tax avoidance than cautious forecasts expect, and capital gains closer to recent strong years.
Birth rates and immigration match what Social Security’s own trustees assumed just last year. This year’s report lowered both. Returning fully to last year’s outlook would be worth about $12 of every $100 of the shortfall; the plan counts on only about $8 of that. A working legal immigration system, including the guest worker initiative below, is one of the few ways policy can directly move this number.

Under the government’s more cautious middle projections, the same plan closes about $80 of every $100. Even then, it turns an automatic benefit cut of about 22% into a much smaller gap that can be finished with modest adjustments.

A guest worker initiative. Seasonal farm guest workers are exempt from Social Security today. Under my plan, employers would pay the full Social Security tax on guest workers’ wages on their behalf, so workers keep their whole paycheck and every job pays in. It’s a small amount of money for Social Security, but it ends a special exemption and treats every worker’s wages the same. It’s also part of a bigger point: a legal immigration system that brings in workers who pay into the system is one of the few things that directly improves Social Security’s outlook.

What I won’t do

Cut benefits for anyone retired today, or anyone over 50.
Raise the retirement age. It stays at 67.
Privatize Social Security. A guaranteed check shouldn’t depend on how the stock market does the year you retire. And every dollar moved into private accounts is a dollar that stops paying today’s retirees, which would blow a new hole in the very fund this plan is trying to fix.
Raise taxes on most working families. More than 9 in 10 workers would pay less than they do now.
Wait for the crisis. Every year of delay makes the fix harder and the choices worse.

Appendix: The details

Idea 1: the payroll tax

One rate of about 11% (11.1%) on all wages and self-employment income, with no cap. Workers and employers each pay half.
Benefits are still calculated on wages up to today’s cap, which rises with wages as it does now. The extra tax above the cap doesn’t earn bigger checks.

Idea 2: income above $200,000 ($250,000 for couples)

Uses adjusted gross income from the tax return, with two changes: 401(k) and other pre-tax contributions are added back, and retirement-account withdrawals, pensions, and Social Security benefits are subtracted.
Applies only to the part of income above the line, so there’s no cliff. The lines rise with wages every year.
Business profits from active work, including S-corporation distributions, pay the full rate, all paid by the owner, as self-employed people already do. An owner who works more than 500 hours a year in the business counts as active, the same test the tax code uses today.
Capital gains, dividends, interest, and rent pay half the rate.
Gains are counted at death for estates over $5 million, so the tax can’t be avoided by never selling. Family farms and businesses that stay in the family can put it off until they’re sold.
Retirees under the line pay nothing new.
Guest worker initiative: end the Social Security exemption for H-2A seasonal farm guest workers. Employers pay the full rate on their wages on the workers’ behalf, so take-home pay doesn’t change.

Idea 3: benefits

No change for anyone now 50 or older.
Slower growth at the top: starting benefits for the highest lifetime earners grow with prices instead of wages. Lower and middle earners keep today’s formula.
Full retirement age stays at 67. Disability benefits are unchanged.
Minimum benefit: anyone with 30 qualifying years of work (a year counts if you earned at least about $20,600 in 2026, 15% of Social Security’s “old-law” wage base, the standard already used for its special minimum benefit; up to five years of disability or full-time caregiving also count) gets a benefit at full retirement age of at least the poverty line, $1,330 a month in 2026, rising with wages. Workers with fewer qualifying years get a partial minimum. Today’s special minimum tops out at $1,123.70 a month and rises only with prices, so it now helps almost no one.