Social Security is in some trouble. People are living longer, but retirement ages have not changed much, so there are not enough young people entering the system to pay all the benefits of people who will retire. It is not a catastrophe, and even in the worst case, retirees in the far future will still get about 75% of the benefits they get right now. But there is a way be can help fix it now.
Simply encourage people to smoke! Smoking does increase medical expenses as the smokers are treated for lung cancer, heart disease and other nasty conditions, but they die off sooner, and this more than offsets these costs!
Look here for a study: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c11584.pdf
No, I am not serious about encouraging people to start smoking (although it is tempting when you meet some rude idiots!), but I am hoping people will be like me and want every dollar of benefits we are entitled too. And maybe this will encourage a few more to quit smoking.
