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Bunping up won't "fix" anything if we have to bump up the cap on SS benefits.
To do one w/o the other is CHANGING SS to a true means tested program.
We may have to go to a MEANS TESTED SS, but that would be a heated battle.
I disagree, when you look at the payout % at the upper income contribution rates it is very small. The benefits are heavily weighted towards benefitting lower wage earners.
To not bump up the cap on benefits while bumping up the cap on contribution would be "stealing", in my opinion. And I wouldn't support it.
Thank you. Another thing addressed by that same report is the fact that we are just seeing the beginning of retirements of "babyboomers". The babyboomers constitute a population "blip" due to a high birthrate from 1946 through 1964. The large number of people born during these years means great pressure on social security.
If social security is losing money now--at the beginning of babyboom retirements--it can only get a lot worse in the next 18 years.
Social security is perfectly salvageable and I suspect it ultimately will be saved. However, its going to take some sacrifice from every group out there. Younger generations will have to accept higher retirement ages. My generation (15 years from drawing social security) will probably have to accept higher taxes. The generation currently receiving benefits could help out simply by allowing Congress to follow the recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles Commission and change the way COLA are computed by going to a chained CPI formula.
We should always be open-minded and be willing to consider other approaches. The approach I won't accept is to leave everything "just the way it is" and wait for the inevitable decline and collapse of the system.
Mark, your comments are what can make this frustrating. It is as you say fixable and the recommendations reasonable. However it seems many of our elected officials are more interested in political points.
Mark, your comments are what can make this frustrating. It is as you say fixable and the recommendations reasonable. However it seems many of our elected officials are more interested in political points.
Tuborg, I fear I sound like a broken record to some here by now. Yet, because of the importance of this issue, I don't think we can afford to let it drop. We have to keep pressing for action, until we get it.
Bunping up won't "fix" anything if we have to bump up the cap on SS benefits.
To do one w/o the other is CHANGING SS to a true means tested program.
We may have to go to a MEANS TESTED SS, but that would be a heated battle.
SSA would not be in trouble if it were left out of the general fund. Once they did that and made that pot all part of the other big pot that the pols spend from it became a piece of trouble. Means testing is an interesting thought. Are you going to tell me because I have the means that all the money I put in all my life will be given to someone who needs it more? If that is your proposal than there is a fight. I would have rather 20 years ago signed away all claim to any SSA if they would stop taking it out. I would have put that money into a fund that would have provided me with all the income and insurance I could possibly need in my retirement. Of course I was shot down. So take my SSA away at great peril.
Its not really i the general fund just that government is the only one that can borrow it and at rate they set with a IOU. In the end regardless SS is stil i problem,s. Alot comes form things that opriginall SS was not intended by law to do. Just the change in definition of disabilty roles hugely.
Its not really i the general fund just that government is the only one that can borrow it and at rate they set with a IOU. In the end regardless SS is stil i problem,s. Alot comes form things that opriginall SS was not intended by law to do. Just the change in definition of disabilty roles hugely.
I was pretty sure that I read somewhere it was part of the general fund. Still it is being used as that. It is that use that is killing it for everyone. There is enough people putting into it to keep it going and now that Pres BO eliminated the tax holiday for us on that we now all pay much more.
Tuborg, I fear I sound like a broken record to some here by now. Yet, because of the importance of this issue, I don't think we can afford to let it drop. We have to keep pressing for action, until we get it.
Mark, not referrencing this forum but in general I get the feeling that those most able to withstand a shock to SS and Medicare are most interested in reforming and those who would take the hardest hit the least. I think there are things just not being told to the broader population by the Executive branch. They are in some places being told by the legislative brance based on their constituents politics.
While all these "arguements" are valid, I personally thing the LARGEST drain on the SS budget is NOT those payments that have been "bought and paid for" but those that are being "handed out".
There are MORE people on SSDI than EVER before...and it is bleeding the system dry trying to keep up.
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