Today, the government reveals new aspects of the social security law amendments, proposing the alternative of gradual application instead of immediate execution. While some may read this tactical retreat as a response to public pressure, a deeper structural reading reveals a scene of "generational escalation". The proposed gradual implementation is nothing but a safe passage ticket for the current generation of officials and policymakers, who are nearing retirement age, to secure their full benefits, while leaving the younger generations the task of confronting the harsh rules of the new social contract.
The crux of the problem in the proposed amendments lies in their timing and design. The official who defends the need for reform and the sustainability of the fund today, at the same time—through the mechanism of gradualism—ensures that these reforms do not affect his legal or financial status. Thus, we are faced with a bureaucratic layer designing a future they do not intend to live in, setting restrictions they will not adhere to.
This gradualism represents a moral gap in public policy; it protects those within the decision-making system currently, and offloads the cost onto those outside it or at its inception among the youth generation. It is a type of legislative selfishness that prioritizes short-term stability for the officials' class at the expense of long-term distributive justice.
While the generation of officials pass through the bridge of gradualism towards a comfortable retirement, the young Jordanian finds himself facing a distorted reality: higher deductions, a later retirement age, and less generous benefit calculations. The implicit message these amendments send to the youth is that social security is no longer an ally to their old age, but a tax box for repairing past management errors they did not partake in.
Charging the youth with the responsibility to cover the actuarial deficit by extending the duration of their contributions and reducing their benefits is a blatant encroachment on them. The youth today face not only difficulties in entering the job market, but are also expected to be the exclusive financiers of a system whose benefits have eroded before they could avail them. This imbalance strikes a fatal blow to the principle of intergenerational solidarity, turning it into generational servitude, where the latter serves the former.
The danger of gradualism lies in its numbing effect on the collective awareness of the crisis; it makes the damage seem distant and abstract to the current generation of decision-makers, thereby weakening the drive towards real reforms in investment efficiency or institutional governance. Instead of confronting the structural problem through creative asset management solutions, the government opts to postpone the crisis temporally, placing it in the lap of future generations.
Real accountability should not focus solely on when to implement the law, but on why the youth are being charged the greater cost. The financial sustainability based on depriving a generation of rights that the previous generation obtained is a fragile sustainability, lacking moral legitimacy and social acceptance.
The governmental review needed is not just a softening of terms, but a necessity to redefine generational justice. Social protection cannot be equitable if it is built on the ruins of the youth's hopes. The needed model is one that distributes burdens and gains fairly, without legal discrimination based on date of birth or date of service entry.
The question remains: Do the policymakers realize that the gateway ticket they grant themselves today might turn into the same bill of alienation that society will pay tomorrow? The real value of social security is not measured by ledger balances, but by the trust it instills in the youth that they are protected in their homeland, not targeted in their future.
