Four uncomfortable questions that could bankrupt the country

Commentary: What's driving the U.S. over a cliff?

Excerpts:

1. First, why do we let people retire too early and then expect them to live so long without working? In 1910, the average retirement age in the United States was 74. In 2002, however, the average retirement age was 62. Average life expectancy in 1910 was around 55, while in 2002 it was 77.
   
2. Second, why do most Americans spend so much of their health care expenditures in the last three months of their life? Fully 27 percent of Medicare is devoted to spending on end-of-life health (in other words, health care that doesn't work), according to the Journal of the American Medical Association.
   
3. Third, why do so many people pay nothing in federal income taxes? According to the Tax Foundation, fully 32 percent of all Americans pay no federal income taxes while 42 percent of single Americans pay no federal income taxes. ... But at some point in time, squeezing the so-called rich will become counterproductive to economic growth, and the pie will start to shrink. It is not fair that so many Americans pay nothing in income taxes to their government.
   
4. Fourth, why is it more profitable to work in the government than to work in the private sector? According to one study, public employees earned benefits worth an average of $13.38 an hour in December 2008, while private-sector workers got benefits worth $7.98 an hour. Overall, total compensation for state and local workers was $39.25 an hour, $11.90 more than in the private sector.
   

Comments:

1. Employers don't want employees that at that old!
   
2. Dying medicine is expensive medicine.
   
3. We need a major revision of the tax code. I don't see it happening.
   
4. Government workers (this is a generalization) vote Democratic (like Union workers)