The “Yin and Yang” facing public policy makers was evident in a recent edition of USA Today® when the editors ran an article on the front page discussing how Social Security is being stretched by long retirements. In the next section, they presented the “yang” with a feature on how seniors live longer by taking care of their minds and bodies.

In a nutshell, the simple fix to the dilemma of potential future bankruptcy of the Social Security System is to not live as long. That’s not going to happen to our wave of self-actualizing Baby Boomers, each bound to hang on to eternal youth and outlive the actuarial tables!

According to the articles, people are collecting benefits an average of seven years longer than they did in 1960. President Bush is seeking to fill the gap created by larger outflows with his plan to allow workers to create private investment accounts from Social Security taxes to generate higher returns that will cover longer retirements.

When Social Security was established in 1935, the retirement age was set at 65…President Roosevelt’s mother raised no fool…the life expectancy was only 63 at the time! Today, the life expectancy for a male child is 77, and if he lives to 65 it is 83. In 1961 the Government lowered the early retirement age to 62. Today, the percentage of men still working at 63 has fallen from 78% in 1960 to 48%.

Longer retirements are stretching a Social Security System to pay more benefits than it was designed to handle. Earlier retirements hit the system with a double whammy, since a retired worker no longer contributes to the system, which essentially has become “pay as you go.”

Social Security administrators would like to see workers stay employed beyond age 62. For each additional year worked, worker retirement benefits go up about 7.5% annually. Today about 55% of workers start collecting benefits at 62, while less than one-fourth wait until 65 or later.

Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has suggested raising the retirement age by one year. He projects that would equal a 7% benefit cut which would help eliminate about one-third of Social Security’s projected $3.7 trillion shortfall over the next 75 years.

We can help our struggling policy makers by staying healthy and working longer. And, as USA Today points out, there is plenty of evidence that we can thwart many debilitating effects of aging, both mentally as well as physically, by taking care of our mind and body.

Studies by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden have found solid evidence that the most active seniors, mentally and physically, reduced their risk of developing dementia by 63% compared to the less active.

Their research indicates the activities that challenge the brain such as card playing, reading, even a good political debate with the spouse or friends now and then, help to stimulate brain cells. While such activity will not prevent Alzheimer’s, a disease partly caused by genetic factors, using the brain, especially in concert with a little physical activity such as a workout in the gym or walking, gives high-risk seniors a better chance of delaying the onset.

Like to dance? Researchers published an article in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2003 that showed ballroom dancing helped protect against Alzheimer’s, as did gardening, playing a musical instrument, and biking. Their findings suggested that physical activity might trigger the production of brain cells to replace those damaged by age.

“Use it or lose it” for our mind and body will help us live longer…and keep our public policy makers squirming over how to keep the checks coming.