Abolish Social Security (house of representatives, attorney, independent, politicians)

[saganista]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

I happen to fall into the category of the baby boomers and because there's such a large bulge in the population of retired people versus workers it means that benefits will have to be cut or it simply can't function. I don't expect to ever get back what I put into the system because of the large number of retirees and the bracket that I happen to fall into.

The baby-boomer problem was resolved a quarter century ago. By essentially doubling the tax on themselves, that group has built up the reserves necessary to fund the systemic blip that their own retirement benefits will cause. The questions all fall on succeeding generations and are with regard to what to do when things return to 'normal' and the baby-boomer bonus has run out, as it was always intended to do.

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

I don't want to abolish social security, I just think we need to stop it from expanding into an even larger bureaucracy.

Actually, the management and administration costs of SS are extremely small. And it's difficult to imagine any system that could effectively manage the accounts of some fifty million beneficiaries that would not also meet the definition of a bureaucracy.

[happyappy]

I have to admit I’ve never made an in-depth study of Social Security and I am fascinated by the detail in this discussion thread—and I’m thoroughly enjoying it. Forgive my lack of knowledge on the subject, but I have a couple of questions.

Wouldn’t the system be much better funded by NOT adding people in large numbers as contributors who will also become beneficiaries, but by a populace whose wealth built thus causing contributions to increase? If, for example, we strongly emphasized becoming manufacturers of goods and services with the development of a great many new businesses whose major market thrust was into overseas markets thereby reducing the trade deficit, and if those new businesses were results-oriented and profit-sharing type (in essence get it now, not later), the income increases would result in a big surge in SS funds. In fact, in such a case, it wouldn’t leave out the possibility of an actual decrease in percentage of contributions from employer/employee.

Also, and forgive me if this is something that is already a part of the program, for those who have built a great deal of wealth and have contributed to the system, is it possible that offering some form of tax breaks might encourage those people to decline receiving benefits thereby reducing pressure on the system?

[saganista]

Originally Posted by chloedog

I see you spend your time picking out minor details in some desperate and lame attempt to make yourself think what you say even matters.

Yada, yada, yada. When you quote from the Washington Times, don't say that it was from the Washington Post. It just makes you look stupid. You can't afford very many more things like that.

Originally Posted by chloedog

...."a Mexican worker would be able to receive "totalized" Social Security benefits with as little as 18 months of work; American workers must work at least 10 years to qualify for benefits." That’s fair!!

They would receive credit from somebody. As in this case would Americans who worked for as little as 18 months in Mexico. Keep in mind that nobody receives any benefits at all except for having worked in covered employment for which the appropriate taxes were paid. You don't just walk in and apply the way you might for food stamps. Without a totalization agreement, it is entirely possible for people to work in two covered economies for years, not just months, and to pay the taxes on all of their earnings, and still see no increase in their ultimate benefits for it. Meanwhile, those who work within just one economy see every dime of their taxes paid reflected in increased benefits. This is the inequity that you either don't see or choose to ignore.

Originally Posted by chloedog

I guess any article that has illegal immigrant in it belongs in the "bile and hatred" forum; even if the articles I post have to do with the thread I post them in.

Has nothing to do with the topics under discussion here. The SS actuaries have plainly stated that the Mexican totalization agreement would have negligible effects on the SSTF. This was just another stretch by you to see how you could work some immigrant-bashing bile and hatred into yet another thread. If the discussion had been about corn prices, you would have noted that many tacos are made from corn and then proceeded in exactly the same manner. Do the rest of us a favor and keep all that over in your bile and hatred playpen where it belongs.

Originally Posted by chloedog

You act like a child that is sitting in a corner kicking and screaming, get over it saganist!! Saganista is upset, him gonna run to the moderators and tug at their shirt and say (while wiping a tear away) " that chloedog hurted my feewins by pwosting thwat biwel and hatewed Mr. Modewator." I am done dealing with your constant whining!

You actually accuse others of constant whining??? That's a good one...

[saganista]

Originally Posted by GregW

I just got into this little discussion and would like to drag it back to the problems with the Social Security system.

First the SS system was never meant to be a federal pension. It was meant to protect people that had diligently saved for their retirement only to loose all their money on a large-scale financial collapse when their bank or broker went broke. It was designed to place a floor under consumption so the grocery stores and landlords could still get paid.

The system was certainly born of different times, but it was indeed designed to create a floor beneath which one could not fall as the result of ill-fortune or other general capriciousness built into the economic system. No sensible person has ever recommended that SS be relied upon as anything but a base to be built upon by those who were able to, and as an at-least-this fallback for survivability for those who, for whatever reason, were not.

Originally Posted by GregW

The system should be returned to a pay as you go plan and not over collect in order to invest in Federal Bonds. This is nothing but a back door way to finance the Federal overspending with a regressive income tax.

SS is and always has been pay-as-you-go. The current surplus being built up in the SSTF is merely the mirror image of the excess of current outlays over current receipts that will occur as the baby-boomer retirement effect hits its maximum. Pay-as-you-go simply will not fund that, so a system of pre-funding was put in place to cover the difference. There is no other reason for large balances being in the SSTF at all. The fact that those surpluses are invested in US Treasury securities and that the proceeds from the sale of those securities have been treated in exactly the same way as those from the sale of every other such security is a separate matter, but the bottom line there is simply the postponement of a need to borrow. In any case, all federal spending is financed. Whether it be by taxes or by borrowing, every dollar of federal spending is taken out of, and immediately (if not sooner) returned to, the private sector.

Originally Posted by GregW

The upper limit on taxable wages should be changed to include all income from all sources so the SS levy is spread evenly across the entire society. Employers should still be required to pay their portion. That way the relatively small number of billionaires would be forced to pay their fair share.

These are political matters, rather than economic ones, but they are among the most sensible of such. The regressive nature of current payroll taxes would indeed mitigate not just for increasing the wage ceiling, but also for establishing a floor in the form of a low-tax tier for low-income workers and a mid-tax tier for mid-income workers. Expanding covered income to include more than just wages and salaries would have a very significant effect also, and would likely be a necessity given any significant move in the ceiling, as those in upper income brackets would otherwise simply shift the form of their compensation in an effort to evade the tax.

Originally Posted by GregW

The payments should have an upper cut offer other income that is indexed for inflation. The index has to include the cost of food, fuel and local taxes unlike the present exceptions. More later.

Not sure where you were going with this one. Hope you'll add the 'more later' part at some point.

Originally Posted by GregW

You mean there is a bile and hatred form - I have to check that out.

Oh, yes. Just click over to the so-called Immigration sub-forum. You'll soon see why Bile & Hatred sub-forum would be just as apt a name for it.

[saganista]

Originally Posted by silas777

Well your close Greg, for one most billionaires probably arent paying into ss...

Every billionaire who has wages and salaries from covered employment is paying into Social Security. Of course, you are quite right in suggesting that those who are able to avoid the rigors of the vaunted meritocracy by living high on the hog off the investment proceeds of inherited fortunes may not be.

Originally Posted by silas777

we need to give people the choice wether they want to participate, if you choose not then you get not.

What positive effects would you project for the system from that? Typically, systems that are based on universal coverage benefit from universal coverage. Maybe you have some alternate theory to propose and substantiate...

[saganista]

Originally Posted by GregW

I think we have given some people a choice about paying taxes. I doubt if the really rich pay their tax accountants generous amounts because they are charitable. It is more than likely they pay the fees because it allows them to pay a lot less in taxes.

A lot less in taxes than what? Than if they tried to do it all themselves is the answer. Tax specialists specialize in knowing all the tax-reducing strategies that one is entitled to. Some are even able to get complex gray areas into tax court and win their cases over the IRS. The only choice involved here is whether one will pay taxes that one isn't required to pay simply because it's cheaper to do so than it is to learn all the associated ropes of what can be a complex tax code.

Originally Posted by GregW

I would like to be able to choose where my taxes were spent for instance. I would not, for example, fund Darth Bush’s exercise in Empire, and would fund the National Parks if I were given a choice.

We have a representative form of government to allow for that. Once you pay them, your taxes aren't 'your money' anymore, but you do have a say in how revenues from all sources are spent.

Originally Posted by GregW

If social security is going to work for the baby boomers in the near future and the hordes of immigrants in the far future then the revenues have to be raised and the payout limited. I would appreciate a comment from Saganista on this point.

Per an earlier post, the matter of the baby-boomers is resolved. They will get all that is due to them and they in fact paid for it. There are questions about how to balance receipts and outlays for the generations that follow the boomers, these having impacts, as I have said, primarily in the second half of the century, but which grow somewhat more difficult of resolution with each passing year. There is at this time no clear indication at all that benefits will need to be reduced. Just as there was not in 1983. Cutting benefits then would have resolved that crisis as well, but a large majority today would be rather happy that a different path from that one was chosen at that time. There are alternatives today as well, and also the principle (followed by the boomers) that those who will benefit most from the system should pick up the lion's share of the costs. With those ideas in mind, rational strategies for the future of SS can and perhaps even will be developed.

[saganista]

Originally Posted by unknown stuntman

I've touched on the subject of privitization numerous times, which logically is the right path.

Nothing logical about it. Privatization is a sham and a hoax. It foists risk onto the general public and reward onto the financial industry. Forced income redistributuon from Granny to Bank One.

Originally Posted by unknown stuntman

It is not the federal government's role nor authority to invest my money.

The government is not investing your money. It is investing the balances accumulated under law in trust funds under its supervsion. It does exactly the same thing with every other trust fund it administers and none of the money in any of those is yours either.

Originally Posted by unknown stuntman

But for the 42% who actually voted to leave it alone and do nothing, I hope every single individual that voted as such is above the age of 50. If you aren't, be prepared to be very dismayed when you hit 70.

Figure out when you will turn 62 if you want to start early, or 67 if you want to start late. If that date is after 2050, there are questions you will need to answer today (well, more or less today) about how much current income your generation wishes to forego now in exchange for a guaranteed livable income later. The generation that was your age around 1890 didn't have this decision to make, and many of them didn't live out their lives at all, or lived them out in relative misery as the result. Choose wisely. The future arrives more quickly than you think.

[saganista]

Originally Posted by happyappy

I have to admit I’ve never made an in-depth study of Social Security....

Almost no one has. This is what makes it so easy for the disingenuous to slip disinformation into the debate and see it established through constant retelling and repetition as common currency. Still bunk, though. Meanwhile, I must travel now to beautiful downtown Berryville. I'll be back later and should have time then to take up another point or two...

[chloedog]

saganista
Yada, yada, yada. When you quote from the Washington Times, don't say that it was from the Washington Post. It just makes you look stupid. You can't afford very many more things like that.

I look stupid? I think someone who can only point out what was obviously a simple mistake is the one that looks stupid! I see by your other posts that you have a habit of pointing out such simple mistakes that others choose to ignore because we are not simple minded and we all realize that people make mistakes. I guess stupid people will always try to make themselves feel some what intellectually superior by picking out simple mistakes made by others.

saganista
You actually accuse others of constant whining??? That's a good one...

No, just you saganist!! I do believe I will have to seek out a restraining order against you saganista, you seem to have some disturbed perversion with me. It kind of makes me feel icky to think about it. I do believe your constant complaining and threats of tattling to the moderators is the definition of whining.


saganista whining to the moderators??

[Jammie]

Originally Posted by YapCity

Agreed.

The SS system, or as I like to call it, Senior Welfare System, is useless. I personally want my money back, with interest. I could do better myself, and that way it will be worth something. When I get these letters in the mail that say my benefit will be like a third of my salary, I want to puke.

What really kills me is everyone is eligible for it. I'm told it may not be there when I retire, AT ALL, but I know of MILLIONAIRES who collect a social security check. Just like certain tax benefits, Social Security should not be doled out to those that are OBVIOUSLY not in need. There is no need for someone with a one million plus net worth at age 65 to be sucking money out of the system. If they want to save social security, that's how to do it. Give it an eligibility threshold. If you are worth more than X, excluding your primary residence, then you should not be getting it.

Of course, THAT will never happen because nobody wants to alienate a group of voters. This is why most things that are wrong with this country are incorrigible. Nobody wants to lose a vote.

~T

Senior welfare system???? Actually, the people who are drawing social security have paid a LOT of money into the system throughout the years. Add their interest to it and a lot of people are coming out on the short end of the deal. When I hear the word "welfare", I always think of something that's GIVEN to someone and SS doesn't fit that category.