For Immediate Release
Tuesday, May 10, 2022
Contact: Hannah Goss, hgoss@azdem.org
Jim Lamon Wants to Privatize Social Security, Raise Retirement Age
“Lamon Would Also Raise The Eligibility Age So People Would Have To Work Even Longer”
PHOENIX — Today, the American Independent reported that Jim Lamon wants to dismantle Social Security.
Per his campaign website, Lamon plans to raise the retirement age and privatize Social Security — two moves that would be devastating for the 1.3 million Arizona seniors who have earned these benefits. Of course, this isn’t especially surprising given his previous support for National Republicans’ plan to hike taxes on nearly 50% of Americans and promise to cut “entitlements” like Social Security and Medicare.
See below for key excerpts from the piece:
Arizona Republican Senate candidate Jim Lamon has repeatedly said he wants to save and preserve Social Security. But his own campaign website reveals that he aims to raise the program’s eligibility age and to privatize it, leaving millions of Americans to fend for themselves.
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[H]is campaign policy page reveals that his idea of saving Social Security is actually making significant cuts to the program and privatizing it for people who are not yet retired.
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Lamon’s plan would force those people to work longer to receive the benefits they are entitled to receive.
A Lamon spokesperson did not immediately respond to an inquiry for this story.
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Experts say a plan like this would benefit the wealthiest Americans and put millions of future retirees at the mercy of the stock market. Someone who put their Social Security funds into a bad investment could be left with nothing, leading to exactly the sort of poverty for senior citizens that the program was designed to end.
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Polls show little support for what Lamon wants to do.
An August 2020 survey by AARP found that 96% of American adults said Social Security was either the most important program or one of the most important programs the government operates.
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In a radio interview that month on Tucson radio station KVOI’s Inside Track, Lamon endorsed entitlement cuts to balance the federal budget, saying, “‘Oh Jim, are you going to take those?’ You’re damn right, because that’s where the money is.”
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