Walter Williams is in error in his column on Aug. 25 titled "Senior citizens who fight reform are being selfish." He presented over-simplistic calculations to claim that Social Security recipients will receive far more in benefits than what they contributed. Not so (unless one makes deck-stacking and poor assumptions). More proper calculations indicate that the accumulation of contributions of an employee and his employers (having worked since age 18) compounded at 6 percent interest will about run out at the statistically expected time of death when receiving Social Security payouts that inflate at 3 percent. Oh, and this includes the extra payout for a "nonworking" spouse who was a stay-at-home parent and had earned no Social Security points. Einstein said, "Make things as simple as possible, but not simpler."
Steven Curtis
Cottonwood Heights