Are people really living longer? That depends...how much money do you have?

Media pundits and Washington elites love to point to their own lives and say, "Hey, we're living longer, why not raise the Social Security retirement age and Medicare eligibility age?"

What they fail to realize is that large gains in life expectancy are closely related to how wealthy a person is. Just look at the case of the two counties in Florida that Washington Post reporter Michael A. Fletcher examined in Research Ties Economic Inequality to Gap in Life Expectancy.

Social Security is our most important family protection program that works not just for retirees, but also for people with disabilities and children who've lost a working parent. It's a promise for all generations. People pay for this benefit throughout their working lives. Social Security is immensely popular with voters across the political spectrum, which is why those who would like to dismantle the program consistently distort the facts and falsely claim the program is "bankrupt." It's important for working people to know the truth about the program and push back against Social Security myths and lies and fight for more, not less retirement security.

Here are six Social Security facts you need to know:

A total of 84,350 pension plans have vanished since 1985. This figure shocked Pulitzer Prize-winning authors Donald L. Barlett and James W. Steele, who just released their latest book, "The Betrayal of the American Dream." Their chapter on retirement chronicles the heist of the American dream's secure retirement by the financial elite and is a very important section of the book, says Steele, who spoke with the AFL-CIO about the retirement crisis. Steele says there's another number we should pay attention to: $17,686. That's the median value of 401(k) accounts in 2011. For most working people, the amount in their 401(k) account would pay them less than $80 a month for life.

Barbara J. Easterling is president of the Alliance for Retired Americans. She was previously the secretary-treasurer of the Communications Workers of America.  

As we near Labor Day, I want to encourage you to help younger generations better understand why labor unions are so important. Too many people either know very little about unions or only know what politicians and Fox News tell them.

Social Security is popular.

It is one of the most, if not the most, popular federal government-run programs. It is social insurance, not welfare. It provides Americans with a reliable source of income when: a senior retires from work, a child loses a working parent or if a worker becomes disabled.

Social Security is an American promise.  We pay into the program during our working lives and we’re entitled to collect benefits. We paid for it. It’s our money.

Even as Alan Simpson rants against anyone who dares to oppose his scheme to raise the Social Security retirement age, a new study finds such an action would have the greatest impact on workers in the most physically demanding occupations—but would have little overall impact on the financial health of  Social Security.

Meanwhile, the California Alliance for Retired Americans—the group at which Simpson directed his most recent rant, calling them “a wretched group of seniors” and “greedy geezers” full of “blather and drivel,” who are “shoveling out bullshit”—is fighting back.

If you’ve watched any of the Republican primary debates, it’s possible to mistake presidential wannabee Mitt Romney as the voice of reason in that group, most of whom long ago teetered off the edge of rational discourse.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney told a group New Hampshire seniors,  including members of the Alliance for Retired Americans, that he supports raising the retirement age or cutting benefits as opposed to asking all taxpayers to pay a fair share to strengthen Social Security.