Our country is not full; not even close. We need more people.

By Michael Randle, EDITOR

Occasionally, I dovetail my editorial column with that of the cover story I write each issue, which is also featured on RandleReport.com and SB-D.com. This is one of those times.

In April of this year, President Trump said the nation was “full;” that it cannot handle any more immigrants or asylum seekers. Guess what? The numbers in the U.S. show the exact opposite is happening, and those numbers are actually predicting a demographic crisis in this country if something is not done and soon.

There are no farmers in this country that are saying, “There are too many Mexicans to employ.” There are no employers — services or manufacturing — that are saying, “We have too many people applying for our new job announcements.” No, they are saying the exact opposite.

Before he retired from politics and as House Speaker, Paul Ryan said as part of a riff on how Republicans planned to tackle entitlement reform in 2018, “This is going to be the new economic challenge for America: People. . . I did my part, but we need to have higher birth rates in this country.”

Ryan also called our benefits “entitlements” and said that “entitlement reforms” are necessary to keep those benefits solvent in future years. Really? Most of us that have labored for decades in our jobs are not looking for “entitlements” when we age out of the workforce. We want the benefits that we paid for through withholding such as FICA, Social Security, Medicare and state and local taxes.

These are not “entitlements.” We paid for these “benefits,” and it is getting more and more likely that the next generation will not receive them — or receive only a portion of them — without two things happening: a major tax increase, especially on the wealthy, or mass immigration of people from around the globe to the U.S. in an effort to boost tax receipts, or both.

So the nation is “full?” Check this out: 10,000 people a day retire in this country on average. . .300,000 Baby Boomers retiring per month. In the last three years, we have averaged 70,000 people turning working age (16) per month. That means we are not replacing about 230,000 workers per month in this country right now.

The fact that we cannot replace our workforce each year has dire consequences. If less people are working, how can Social Security and Medicare be funded in future years? Perhaps that’s why some politicians are changing the word “benefits” to “entitlements.” Don’t fall for that. We paid for those benefits and I predict that any politician — red or blue — that calls benefits entitlements will be shown the door in quick order. After all, in 10 years, when the funding of benefits becomes a real issue, people in or near retirement will make up more than half the voting age population.

So, what are the solutions? We only have two solutions to fund these benefits. We can raise taxes, specifically on the wealthy, or we can increase legal immigration from about 1 million per year to 3 million per year. It’s more people, or higher taxes, or both to save our benefits like Social Security.