Sage Hou '23
Social Security was like the Gun Control issue of modern-day Washington - the “third rail” of policy - for it “burned” anyone who touches it. In 1983, the Social Security Trust fund was poised to begin running a deficit, and congress needed to reform the broken system. Both sides of the aisle knew the reforms gave them an opportunity to tilt the political future in their favor. During the debate, Democrat Leader Senator Moynihan reminded his colleagues that “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." The Democrats accepted an increase in retirement age, Republicans accepted a tax increase on the self-employed, and social security reform passed with bipartisan support and was signed into law a month and a half after it was introduced to the house.
In 2013, strong partisan disagreements over the delay and reduction of funding for Obamacare (ACA) caused a 16-day government shutdown, leading around 800,000 federal employees to be furloughed and requiring 1.3 million federal employees to work without the knowledge of when their next paycheck would come. For more than two weeks, neither side of the aisle dared to budge, and within only hours before the country would breach the debt limit, Speaker of the House Boehner publicly admitted defeat and supported a bill to reopen the government. He said, “We fought the good fight, we just didn't win.”
Within the span of 30 years, America’s political landscape has changed from one of cooperation and the interests of the American people to one of bipartisan disunity and the interests of their respective parties.
Modern-day American politics would’ve seen this piece of legislation dragged on for months, with lawmakers likely using the filibuster, holding the Senate floor meaninglessly, twisting facts to make the situation appeal to Americans in favor of their own reforms, and even possibly shutting down the government and risking the livelihoods of millions of federal workers and their families.
However, the ‘80s were clearly different from today.
“Everyone is entitled to their own opinions,” Moynihan famously quipped, “but not their own facts.” In the end, the group’s reforms to the Social Security Act passed and were signed into law by President Reagan. Both sides of the aisle knew they had an opportunity to change the situation in their favor.
When Republican Senator Bob Dole and Democratic Senator Daniel Moynihan led a bipartisan group to translate these recommendations into legislation leaders of their respective parties
A partisan issue and a singular partisan bill could change the landscape for millions of Americans, for years to come, and both sides of the aisle knew the stakes were high. If the other party was able to pass a bill reforming Social Security, the system would have made a significant impact on millions of Americans for years to come.
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