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America's first 'baby boomer' files for Social Security

Posted: Monday, October 15, 2007 3:59 PM
Filed Under:

By John Rutherford, NBC News Producer

WASHINGTON –

America's first "baby boomer" filed for Social Security benefits Monday, becoming among the first of nearly 80 million Americans born after World War II who are expected to apply for such benefits over the next two decades.

Kathleen Casey-Kirschling, 61, was born one second after midnight on Jan. 1, 1946. She becomes eligible for Social Security in two and a half months. On Monday, she completed filing electronically for the benefits before a horde of reporters and photographers at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

"It was great, it was great," she said afterward. "It is so user friendly, and I hope that many of my fellow boomers will take the easy way out, because applying on-line just made it much easier to go through the whole process."

Bracing for a 'silver tsunami'
Casey-Kirschling, a retired seventh grade teacher who lives on Maryland's Eastern Shore, will get her first check (for an undisclosed amount) in early February.

"I'm thrilled to think that after all these years that I'm getting paid back the money that I put in," she said.

Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue said there's plenty of money in the system...for now.

"There's no reason to have any immediate panic," he said. "Retirement benefits right now, the funds are solvent through 2041."

And beyond then?

"I think I and most people who are really familiar with the situation are confident that there'll be some pain along the way, but we'll get there, and Social Security will be there for future generations," said Astrue.

In what's being called America's "silver tsunami," 10,000 Americans a day will become eligible for Social Security benefits over the next 20 years.

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Comments

I'm a boomer and have been collecting Social Sec.
since March 2007.  So am I the first?...lol

Ross (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:30 PM)

well I am the very last baby boomers, so I do not hold much hope for my retirement from Soc. Security, although I am paying just like the first boomers retiring

Jackson, Marco Island, Florida (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:32 PM)

Where is all of this money going to come from???
We already have a war that has been placed on the
USA credit card...We are a nation heading quickly
toward bankruptcy....All of these people retiring at
60 needs to be re-exaluated, people live longer and
do not need to retire until 72. If you look at death rates when this started it should have been on a sliding scale whith age of death!  This country is nothing but give away programs one after another...
No nation that can't even celebrate health care for their people and a balanced budget should take this seriously...We are a joke to the world!!!

DEB-Z, Providence, RI (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:42 PM)

I am under the impression she will not be eligible for benefits until she is 62 1/2 years old -  

Joanne Shagi - Stockton, Ca. (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:43 PM)

Most people do not realize that the Social Security Administration system will only fund about 74.5 percent of the total amount. Please read the inside page of the most recent statement sent to you recently. The Politicians have been using IOUs to pay for Pork Barrel Spending and Earmarks for pet projects for the State they represent. If they had to rely on the same Social Security System that the American People Do the Federal System alonfg with Medicare would not be going broke in the next few years. All Politicians are Corrupt and Criminal including President Bush and his Administration. Just read stopspp.com The end of America is very near and the Assholes in Washington are at fault. They have screwed the American People Again.

James, SanDiego (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:54 PM)

Much better to wait until age 70.  MSNBC Article http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15240918/ -- Start collecting Social Security at 62 — or wait?
Retiring early means more payments — but a smaller check for life.  Each year beyond full retirement age accrues at 7 or 8% per annum.

Barry Jackson, Long Beach, CA (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:57 PM)

Since when did January 1, 1946 become the start of the "Baby Boom" generation? When I was growing up it was June 1, 1946, which was about 9 months after the end of WWII. Unlike the person mentioned above I lead the life of the grass hopper, and have only my SS to look forward  to. So I will wait until I'm 70 to sign-up for benefits, thats when it peaks, and hope that it will be enough!

Paul McClelland, Vista, California (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 6:58 PM)

The answer to this problem is very simple .  Every pay check I receive , I pay Federal Income Tax .  There is no limit involved .   In the State I live in we also have a State Income Tax to pay .   Taken out of every pay check I receive .  No limit involved .    Why is the Social Security Tax not treated the same way ?    There should be no limit on this as well .    But if you really believe that there needs to be a limit , at least set it at about 500.00 Thousand .   I can assure you that you would not have to worry about the S.S. program for a long long time if it was handled this way .  

Dynamite, Atlanta , Georgia (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:00 PM)

One should not feel guilty in asking for their own money from the government.  After all, there seem to be plenty of it for illegal aliens and their families, so why not to those who deserve it.

Barry Gold, Irvine, CA (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:02 PM)

As an SSA employee, the thought of 10,000 a day with our already understaffed agency is frightening!

Anonymous Florida (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:07 PM)

61 seems too young to retire.  

Kris, BH (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:09 PM)

This is great for her, but you better plan on taking care of yourself.  The Dem's are gonna wreck SS somewhere along the way.  They'll blame it on the Rep's, as they do all their screwups, but it will be the Dem's who end up doing the program in, and America with it.

John Bates, Monett, MO (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:19 PM)

We(Gen-X)are so screwed!

j marzette, Westminster CO (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:26 PM)

everyone pays into social security thats great, but why does the rich get it.they don't need it, make them pay there share but don't give it to them. it would solve the money shortage.i mean how many cars and houses does one person need.

jane doe (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 7:50 PM)

On behalf of all GenX and GenY, I say with muted enthusiasm:

"So long, farewell, Auf wiedersehen, goodbye."

James, Seattle WA (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:07 PM)

It the country would wake up and allow some SS funds to be invested in  the stock market we could fix this problem~!

D Buchanan (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:19 PM)

Somehow, I doubt that most baby boomers will actually quit working when they hit 62.  Most of us will likely file for social security along the way as we become eligible, but we're not likely to stop making money just because we're old enough to finally retire from one thing or another.  All my peers seem to be motivated to live for several decades beyond traditional retirement age.  Don't be surprised to see many of us continue to contribute to social security well into our 70's and 80's even.  We're a wild bunch with high expectations of ourselves.  Personally, I want to be around to see my grandchildren's children graduate from college; I'll be in my 90's by then.

Cathy, WA State (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:20 PM)

Above, Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue stated that the funds are solvent through 2041. If this be true, why is there a push to "save" social security? Is the "save social security movement" just another exscuse to raise our taxes?

Joseph C. Ellis (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:24 PM)

"I think I and most people who are really familiar with the situation are confident that there'll be some pain along the way, but we'll get there, and Social Security will be there for future generations," said Astrue.

I think what Mr. Astrue meant to say in terms of "pain" (gov't doublespeak) that a lot of people will get screwed out of their full SS benefits, but there will be plenty for all the illegal aliens who haven't paid into the it.  Better start maxing out your 401K contributions.  SS is a bust.

Big Dog, MI (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:38 PM)

quote from Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue: "I think I and most people who are really familiar with the situation are confident that there'll be some pain along the way, but we'll get there, and Social Security will be there for future generations"

The question is what will be the "pain". No one wants to talk about it. I am at the end of the so-called baby boom, born 15 years later. I constantly wonder what I will get back from social security. Will I be required to work longer than those before me, get lesser benefits, have higher contributions. I am not even sure I will get back what I paid into the system.
I have long hoped that social security would be put in the control of those who have contributed, not the politicians. My pensions should be mine, under my control. And if I die before it is gone, I should be able to leave it to my children, not to the government or my former employers.

Martin, Los Angeles, CA (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 8:54 PM)

Retire at 62?  Now, really.  My mother is still working as a psychiatric nurse at 76.  I hope to stay in the workforce until I'm in my mid 70's as well.  How could anyone in good health stand to sit home for all those years?

Matt Perry, Roswell, Georgia (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:24 PM)

I just hope the American public will not go on a 'boomer' hatred binge. We've unfairly been the scape goats for a lot of the country's ills. Also, we have contributed for decades to the system, and should not be looked at as robbing it now that we are applying for benefits. I am hoping to stay in good health and plan on working until I am 70.

Jill Dunn (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:25 PM)

Social security Sucks!!! go with the Texas plan where all workers have full rights to all monies and better-much better benefits.   the current system is a shame and there's better options out there- TEXAS plan. Galveston Co and 2 other texas counties are the best retirement plan out there.

rob fricke high point NC 27265 (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:27 PM)

Social Security is wonderful for most common people except for those of us falling under the "government pension off-set" provisions.  We paid into it and are eligible but unfairly denied.  As a 39 yr retired cop I would have been better off growing marijuana!

Roger Phillis, Williamstown, W.Va. (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:30 PM)

I hate to call this to anyone's attention but she isn't the first baby boomer to file for SS, war ended semptember 1, 1945 I was born October 24, 1945, I  have been on SS disabilily for a number of years, so I didn't file for 62, as it just converts to regular SS on my birthday

david miller (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:52 PM)

WoW! I did not know she is the first "Baby Boomer"! Congrats to her! Retirement, here we !

mike, manassas, virginia (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 9:53 PM)

And there would be plenty of money for the next hundred years if congress and our so called leadership would put the money back into the Social Secrurity System that that stole years ago combined with the proper interest it should have been making for all these decades.

Karl Bratcher, Florence, Oregon (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 10:19 PM)

What is unfortunate is America is so good at extending lives of older people, and so poor at keeping youth alive (Highest infant mortality next to Liberia in the industrial world) that keeping SS solvent will get hit in both directions.

Not enough youth to pay for the aged that are being kept alive for the longest period in the history of the world.

G. Behrend (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 10:34 PM)

   It would have been forever solvent if Johnson had left it a separate intity of the government. But ...NOOOOOO, he had to put all the FICA monies into the General Fund.....therby dooming it for future generations....

R. Buzbee (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:01 PM)

 If our goverment would get spending under control by monitering the PORK BARRELL spending of the people
we elected to look after or interests, the monies in the S.S.I. system would be adequate.  Quit borrowing from the system and learn to manage OUR money better.  UP coming Boomer

Lee Bloxham Gillette Wy, (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:11 PM)

UH OH!!!!!!!!! are our favorite government benifits gonna go bankrupt? haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahaha

Jordan Smith, Rancho Cucamonga, California (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:14 PM)

World bankruptcy courts, here we come!

Alen B. (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:18 PM)

The self-obsessed boomers have sucked the best out of every phase of life they pass through, hoarded it and left the scraps for the rest of us, next is Social Security.  The only good news is, we know what comes after Social Security...

Rick S. New York (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:20 PM)

What a stupid article!!! plenty of baby boomers have collected Social Security  for years as disabled former workers!! The timing and tone of this sounds like a Bush hugger trying create another alarm over the future of Social Security. If the goverbment only used Social Security funds for SS payments instead of treating them as general cash to be spent on any part of the budget - there would never be a crisis as baby boomers beeen paying all their lives while the retired group was much smaller than them. Social Security should have accumulated a large surplus. Congress and past presidents' should repay out of their own perks the moneies they've stolen from Social Security over the years!!

Ronnie Langlie, Schenectady, NY (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:33 PM)

Hey, as long as I am not reduced to eating cat food, I'm going to be a happy  man.

Sidney M. Bounds, Mesquite, Nevada (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:44 PM)

10,000 AMERICANS per day. That is alot of SSI dollars folks. That means that just with the UNITED STATES CITIZENS who are becoming eligible after having paid into the system for years, the monthly cash outlay is going to grow by 3-5 million dollars per month... for twenty years. How about the thousands of newly endowed illegal aliens should democrats have their way? Why is it that when an ILLEGAL ALIEN is caught in this country, they are processed and given a piece of paper to continue doing what they were doing illegally, and may even get subsidized by our tax dollars for it. But let a citizen of the United States break a law that should never have been pased to begin with and that person's life can be utterly destroyed? Someone please explain to me how this somehow translates to justice and freedom for the CITIZENS OF THIS NATION.

D. R. Smith, Clarksville, TN (Sent Monday, October 15, 2007 11:50 PM)

What's the problem.  Just lift the cap on income taxed for social security and there will be plenty of money for benifits for all! All income taxed the same.  That's the answer.  

Stefan Ostrach, Eugene, Oregon (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 12:11 AM)

Congratulations! - From my understanding California teachers, (which I am one) don't get social security as they have their own state retirement. Does Maryland teachers get to double dip on retirement wages? Can anybody tell me what gives?

Rosemary Hart, Whittier, Ca (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 12:22 AM)

It is said that if the congress would keep their hands out of the Social Security Fund for just one year it would solve all of the so called problems of the SSI.  What could we expect if the law was enacted to make them STOP all raiding of these funds. WAKE UP AMERICA, they are stealing your future.

Timothy J. Murphy - Pontiac, Michigan 48340 (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 12:25 AM)

"I'm thrilled to think that after all these years that I'm getting paid back the money that I put in," she said.

Except she's NOT getting back the money she paid in.  That money has already been given to the previous generation of senior citizens and disabled adults.  She's now getting the money that I'M current paying in.  

The problem is that the system is set up as a government sponsored ponzi scheme - and for a ponzi scheme to work, you need more people paying in than receiving.  The baby boomers, and their immediate elders (the silent generation) should have had more kids, I guess....but they didn't and we have a situation where the system as-is is unsustainable (and for the record, I am quite happy that they didn't).

Please let me stress that I am not begrudging this woman her right to receive her social security check nor am I condoning generational warfare.  My mother is also an "early" boomer and will become eligible in the next few years - and I am very glad that she will be able to benefit from her 40+ years of contribution into the system.  But to be fully aware of the coming deluge of benefit requests and to take no action is fiscal suicide and an abdication of responsibility to all future generations.  

Let’s hope that this momentous occasion will serve as a HUGE wake up call to Congress and the American people that the imminent retirement of the baby boom generation can no longer be ignored.    

Amy, San Diego, CA (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 12:46 AM)

solution for social security which I have submitted my ideal to the speaker of the house before she took her new position in congress and that is to eliminate state taxes. She has done nothing, but the ideal is better than what Mr Bush wanted to create. This ideal is for the younger generations after I am gone. This ideal would benefit them.

Peter Tamayo, Wahiawa, HI 96786 (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 1:02 AM)

Ok they collect but how about us who are working and putting into this social security fund. Will there be any monies for us and if not can we sue the government too spending our money and not having it there for us?

j pa (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 1:30 AM)

Kathleen Casey-Kirshling is hardly the first "Post WW II Baby Boomer," since when her mother became pregnant, the war was still being fought in Europe and in Asia!!!  The "Post WW II Baby Boomers" are those of us born starting in late May-early June 1946, after the war had ended.  My mother got pregnant the weekend following V-J Day, in August 1946, and I made my appearance two weeks late in June 1946.  And Kathleen is collecting at age 62?  Give me a break!

Betty Cordoza, Sonora, CA (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 2:17 AM)

Bush would love us to give up half of our Social Security so the Illegal immigrants could get it since they never payed into it. if congress lets them in, the program is doomed. Here's a thought,Why not pay back the 1.4 trillion dollars borrowed from SS fund by the Government and the fund would be fully solvent again. I have been paying into SS for 40 years and I will not stand by and let us be robbed of what we invested in. Why should are funds  be reduced? Skimming off half of what 80 million people have coming is  criminal.

Paid in Full. (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 3:02 AM)

Bush would love us to give up half of our Social Security so the Illegal immigrants could get it since they never payed into it. if congress lets them in, the program is doomed. Here's a thought,Why not pay back the 1.4 trillion dollars borrowed from SS fund by the Government and the fund would be fully solvent again. I have been paying into SS for 40 years and I will not stand by and let us be robbed of what we invested in. Why should OUR funds  be reduced? Skimming off half of what 80 million people have coming is  criminal.

Paid in Full. (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 3:03 AM)

I'm glad she's so excited to be the first in a wave of financial ruin for the USA.

Jon, Pullman, WA (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 4:40 AM)

Those of us who are in our sixties have been promised Social Security throughout our lives and have paid into the system for decades.  Now, when it's time to cash in, the whining begins.  We could have put those funds into our own retirement plans, but were not given that opportunity.  Make up your mind, people.
(This message doesn't really apply to this article, but I'm just irritated at the latest news that we're going to Hell in a handbasket because of the drain the aged are putting on our country.  We've contributed what we were required to contribute by our government.  So, boys & girls, get over it!  Pay the people.)  

Pamela Mahan (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 5:38 AM)

"Silver tsunami" is a slap in the face label for a group of people who more than any other paid for the Social Security benefits of those before them.

Michael Regan, Andrews, NC (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 6:53 AM)

Good for her an when i hit 61 i will do the same thing ive worked all my life .i deserve it.So before they give any more of our money away to this and that
it can g in my pocket..thanks for the gumball popeye

susan rosencrans,pasadena.md (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 6:56 AM)

The 'Silver Surfers' riding the 'Silver Tsunami'.  I can just picture it... To the offspring of the Greatest Generation that ever lived - thank you and enjoy a much needed break.

Kevin Patterson, Brunswick, GA. (Sent Tuesday, October 16, 2007 7:35 AM)



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