The Coming Generational Storm: What You Need to Know About America's Economic Future - Hardcover

"This may be the year's most important book." --Choice; "Having painted a fiscal picture as awful as 'Guernica,' the authors unveil two bold plans.... Their ideas are thoughtful and, whatever doubts one might have, preferable to the status quo, which sticks the country's entire financial future in the ICU." --Tod G. Bucholtz, The Wall Street Journal; "Lays out the problem in understandable language and compelling detail." --Washington Post; "The policy solutions of Kotlikoff and Burns are specific and ingenious.... Moreover, one of the real strengths of [their] book is that it gives some good insights about how individuals can prepare themselves for a future economy in which tax rates and inflation rise and social benefits become smaller.... [T]he real import of their argument is that even with growth, the financing of the current entitlement system will eventually have to be dramatically rebuilt- and that's a message that should be heard." --Michael Mandel, Business Week; "This is a book any serious investor should absorb and act upon. If you're one of the 77 million American Baby Boomers to whom it is addressed... you'd best read it soon." --Jonathan Chevreau, National Post; "A serious attempt to look at a problem that most people are trying to ignore." --Alan Beattie, Financial Times; "Here's a book to help us batten down the hatches." --Chris Tucker, Dallas Morning News"

In 2030, as 77 million baby boomers hobble into old age, walkers will outnumber strollers; there will be twice as many retirees as there are today but only 18 percent more workers. How will America handle this demographic overload? How will Social Security and Medicare function with fewer working taxpayers to support these programs? According to Laurence Kotlikoff and Scott Burns, if the U.S. government continues on the course it has set, we'll see skyrocketing tax rates, drastically lower retirement and health benefits, high inflation, a rapidly depreciating dollar, unemployment and political instability. The government has lost its compass, say Kotlikoff and Burns, and the current administration is heading straight into the coming generational storm. But don't panic. To solve a problem you must first understand it. Kotlikoff and Burns take us on a guided tour of our generational imbalance, first introducing us to the baby boomers - their long retirement years and "the protracted delay in their departure to the next world." Then there's the "fiscal child abuse" that will double the taxes paid by the next generation.