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Looking back at how much I have paid into Social Security in the last 35 years, and looking ahead to the probabilty that there may be nothing there in 15 years, sometimes I have to wonder if I couldn't have done better with the money through the years......either paying down the mortgage or putting into savings, etc.
On the other hand, there are many people that depend on their SS for food, housing and medications. Also, the pictures from the 30's of soup lines and widespread poverty haunt me. Would we be better going back to that??
If you were born in 1950, and averaged an income of $50,000 in today's dollars, your average lifetime rate of return on social security would be 1.67%. If you put that money into the stock market as a well diversified portfolio over the same time period, your average rate of return would be 7.05%. Using social security instead of the stock market is an incredibly poor decision. This isn't a political question, it is a math problem.
surely sales taxes just hit the poor harder - after all, one can only eat and consume so much whatever your income?
Do you really imagine that the rich don't spend much, much more than the poor? The rich shelter their income in many ways and often pay zero taxes. They can't avoid spending. BTW, aren't you the late leader of Kenya?
No, tax only consumption, but with no exceptions or loopholes. Social Security must be salvaged at all costs. A vast number of seniors depend on it to survive, and they can't start their lives over from the beginning again..
Go to nearly any developing country and you'll see this.
Where I live now (Cambodia) , I see a lot of old folk pushing carts around the streets, begging, eating scraps of food from the rubbish - all about the same age as my mother.
no safety net or jobs for these people - do we really want this in our own countries?
surely not.
Are you saying you would let your mother beg in the streets? Why wouldn't you take care of her?
I would be much better off without social security because I could have paid off my house years ago, and then started investing money.
Childless people are the most wealthy because they don't have to pay babysitters or all the costs of children so they wouldn't need social security or their children taking care of them. That's the flaw in the rational of the third world, they think having 14 or 15 children will guarantee them a free caretaker when they're old but if they had only the children they could afford and saved money through the years, they'd be better off.
On the other hand, if the government wasn't robbing us of all this money, we could leave the money we made to our children, inheritances would be better.
Social Security was a big mistake, it assumes that people should be irresponsible and dependent on the government for everything.
Without SS we would have a whole lot more destitute elderly that were cheated of their savings by irresponsible stock market, their savings by mortgage bank collapses and their pensions by Bain Capital.
The government may be inept at times but it, at least as far as SS is concerned, it is not inimical. The same cannot be said for the private sector as currently dominated by greedy thieves and deluded fools. I would prefer both a universal government operated retirement and medical system than trust my money and health to the undisciplined Children of Mammon.
FWIW -
How many of the Cambodian elderly had their families KILLED by our indiscriminate bombing of their country back in the 60's and 70's. There are worse things than Social Security Insurance and starving to death in the dark while suffering from a hideous disease is just one of them.
Whining about “what I could have done with that money” is just tiring. Most people would have spent the money on trivia and beer and you all know that.
Without SS we would have a whole lot more destitute elderly that were cheated of their savings by irresponsible stock market, their savings by mortgage bank collapses and their pensions by Bain Capital.
The government may be inept at times but it, at least as far as SS is concerned, it is not inimical. The same cannot be said for the private sector as currently dominated by greedy thieves and deluded fools. I would prefer both a universal government operated retirement and medical system than trust my money and health to the undisciplined Children of Mammon.
Greg - Social Security has averaged 4.22 times less than the stock market over the last few decades. Can you show your data that suggests otherwise? Without SS, retirees would have several times more money than they do today. If you can make this claim, I assume you have done the math. Please show your calculations where you found out that SS is better than the stock market.
Are you saying you would let your mother beg in the streets? Why wouldn't you take care of her?
Of course I would take care of my mother - but what if I died before her?
What if she never had any children or became estranged to them?
What if I were a beggar myself?
etc...
So this is why I think that some kind of safety net for the elderly must be a good thing.
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