Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump wants to deport all illegal aliens and sharply restrict legal immigration. I’ll leave the foolishness of the first for another post; I’m more interested in the restriction on legal immigration Trump is proposing here.

He also calls for “a pause” in all immigration, for an unspecified period.

That was buried in the WSJ op-ed at the link. I’ve not seen anything even remotely definitive on Trump’s plans for Social Security, so I have to ask: how does he plan to fund that program?

When Social Security was created, it was an income supplement program, retirees had an average lifespan in retirement of around five or six years, and there were seven workers paying into the system for every retiree taking out. Today, Social Security is an income replacement program (if not at a 100% rate), retirees have an average lifespan in retirement of around fifteen years, and there are only three workers paying into the system for every retiree taking out, and that number is falling toward two.

How does Trump plan on increasing the supply of workers paying into the system, absent increased immigration? Alternatively, how does Trump plan on funding Social Security payout per retiree at current the current level? Alternatively, how far does Trump plan on reducing the Social Security benefit payout?

There are a lot of ways to deal with Social Security; I’d like to hear Trump’s way in combination with his immigration policy.