I almost hesitate to post this…

…knowing I’m just going to get more "noun-verb-Campaign Finance Reform" in the comments again.

But. Earlier this week I wrote about the Cap Times’ heads-in-the-sand editorial on Social Security – their solution, of course, is fear of investment and “minor reforms, such as requiring wealthy Americans to pay their fair share.”

Writing in today’s Wall Street Journal, R. Glenn Hubbard gives us some idea what that would mean:

The spending shortfalls in Social Security and Medicare are large. According to the Congressional Budget Office, Social Security and Medicare spending left unchecked would, after a generation, consume about 10 percentage points more of GDP than it does today.

Simple arithmetic suggests that with this much more of GDP eaten up by the two programs, all federal taxes on average would have to be raised by more than 50% to make up the shortfall.