The Senators write that instead of reducing the benefits, the government should adopt what they call a common-sense solution: lifting the Social Security payroll tax cap.

Warren and Moreno say that this is one way to make the payroll tax and solve the Social Security funding crisis for "another generation.”

More From the New York Times:

For 2026, the payroll tax cap, or taxable maximum, is $184,500. Workers and their employers each pay 6.2 percent on wages up to that amount. (Self-employed individuals pay 12.4 percent.) Today, the maximum Social Security withholding for one worker is $22,878, or 12.4 percent of $184,500. Not a penny more, even if an individual’s salary far exceeds $184,500.

Since the vast majority of Americans make less than that, most people are paying Social Security taxes on 100 percent of their earnings, while the highest earners are paying on only part of theirs.

Why should a middle-class nurse pay a larger share of her paycheck than a wealthy corporate lawyer? This is doubly unfair in an economy in which top earners’ wages, over time, have pulled far ahead of those of the average worker.

According to one estimate, eliminating the payroll tax cap would inject around $3 trillion into the program over the next 10 years. Lifting the cap so that all income is treated the same would generate substantial revenue that would extend the solvency of Social Security for another generation.

But what Warren and Moreno do not tell readers is that lifting the payroll tax cap would result in the largest tax increase in more than four decades.

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