Means-Testing Social Security

It sounds a bit odd to say that Bill Gates is going to need a check from the government to keep him comfortable when he retires, so some form of "means-testing" is often proposed as a Social Security cure-all. There's something to this idea, but as Kathy Ruffing points out benefits for rich people amounts for a very small slice of overall Social Security spending:

This reflects the fact that not that many people are rich, and Social Security contributions are capped at around the $100k income level. If I had my druthers, I really wouldn't cut Social Security at all. If you're going reduce future tax increases by means-testing something, the thing to do is to impose Jason Furman-style cost sharing on Medicare so that it has a deductible that's defined as a share of income. But still under that plan you'd be meaningfully reducing benefits for middle class people in order to save any meaningful amount of money.