PUBLIC-OPINION TOWARD COSTS AND BENEFITS OF SOCIAL-SECURITY AND MEDICARE

Although most surveys show overwhelming support for old-age benefits a mong people of all ages, few surveys cover cost-benefit trade-offs in aging policy. Questions piloted by the American National Election Stud ies in 1991 surveyed attitudes not only about Social Security and Medi care expansion but also about taxes on Social Security benefits and th e trade-off between increasing taxes and reducing elderly medical bene fits. Path analysis is used to examine the influences on these benefit , tax, and cost-benefit trade-off items for elderly and nonelderly res pondents. Attitudes toward taxes on Social Security benefits are shape d more by self-interest, and less by partisanship and ideology, than b y attitudes toward benefits and cost-benefit trade-offs. Although ther e is some evidence of generational conflict, there is more conflict wi thin generations than between them.