31% Of Americans Have No Retirement Savings At All (difference, taxed, vehicle)
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What about we maintain the SS/Medicare system only for those who know or suspect they're going to need it, and end it completely for all those who are doing so well they don't? The former pays in at a higher rate than now, the latter does not. The former gets out only what they have paid in, with the simple idea that they have loaned the gov't that full amt over their working lives and now they want it back...with interest with monthly payouts after retirement.
If you think this idea through at all, you'll realize its adoption would bring an end to the system completely. All the people who don't want these programs could get out of them. This would include the following groups:
1. The well-to-do (like myself) who pay maximum tax and will receive the maximum benefit allowed. We pay in more than we will get back out of the system and a private system of some sort would be an economic benefit to us. Provided, of course, we have enough discipline to save and invest and we make wise investments.
2. Short-sighted middle income people who believe they can save enough money on their own to make up the different or more commonly, those who simply have many pressing needs right now and can't resist the opportunity to not pay social security taxes in the short run.
3. The working poor who desperately need something like social security, but want to spend the money on immediate needs. However, most would probably stay in the system.
Social Security is structured in a way where higher income people subsidize lower income people's retirements. If the system becomes weighted down with only lower income people, sustaining benefits will become an even greater issue than it is today. This strategy would bring a total collapse of Social Security.
We have not ended poverty in America by a longshot. However, programs like Social Security have ameliorated much of the potential sting of being poor. You don't find many people in this country living out on the streets. You will find hordes of them doing so if Social Security is ever discontinued as a program.
Its going to take heavy lifting, including tax increases, but as a nation our literal well-being depends on sustaining this type of program. The aged population will continue to increase. We can't just dump these people on the street. Something like this wouldn't even have been an issue 20 or 30 years ago. Today, it seems fashionable to tell the poor, the sick, and the elderly they are to blame for their predicament and tune them out. There are days I barely recognize the country I grew up in and it makes me very sad indeed.
No doubt, and most likely those programs will tick along, or sputter along as the demands exceed the assets and the liberals pontificate about "sharing the wealth" and assume, as they always do, that the taxpayers pockets are bottomless pits.
But what DOES happen when they really do run out of other people's money and those left have no concept of self-reliance?
Do you believe in moving to privatizing Social Security at all? Even for the younger generation?
Privatization of SS and Medicare is also the inevitable result of the government being unable to sustain the funding of. Those with means will continue and expand providing for themselves. The reality is that the thread topic as stated by the OP is about privatizing retirement income and 31% have not as yet begun to do so. Absent SS this will continue and funds now going to SS contributions will be added to their privatized retirement stash.
If you think this idea through at all, you'll realize its adoption would bring an end to the system completely. All the people who don't want these programs could get out of them. This would include the following groups:
1. The well-to-do (like myself) who pay maximum tax and will receive the maximum benefit allowed. We pay in more than we will get back out of the system and a private system of some sort would be an economic benefit to us. Provided, of course, we have enough discipline to save and invest and we make wise investments.
2. Short-sighted middle income people who believe they can save enough money on their own to make up the different or more commonly, those who simply have many pressing needs right now and can't resist the opportunity to not pay social security taxes in the short run.
3. The working poor who desperately need something like social security, but want to spend the money on immediate needs. However, most would probably stay in the system.
Social Security is structured in a way where higher income people subsidize lower income people's retirements. If the system becomes weighted down with only lower income people, sustaining benefits will become an even greater issue than it is today. This strategy would bring a total collapse of Social Security.
We have not ended poverty in America by a longshot. However, programs like Social Security have ameliorated much of the potential sting of being poor. You don't find many people in this country living out on the streets. You will find hordes of them doing so if Social Security is ever discontinued as a program.
Its going to take heavy lifting, including tax increases, but as a nation our literal well-being depends on sustaining this type of program. The aged population will continue to increase. We can't just dump these people on the street. Something like this wouldn't even have been an issue 20 or 30 years ago. Today, it seems fashionable to tell the poor, the sick, and the elderly they are to blame for their predicament and tune them out. There are days I barely recognize the country I grew up in and it makes me very sad indeed.
Do you believe in moving to privatizing Social Security at all? Even for the younger generation?
It will never happen.
Congress borrowed all the money and put non negotiable Treasuries in there.
Congress would have to pay back all the money they took first before any discussions could happen.
Congress raped the SS fund because "it was there".
Do you believe in moving to privatizing Social Security at all? Even for the younger generation?
Possibly, I guess the devil would be in the details. Or possibly set it up so that folks can choose between the public and private systems?
I believe that overhauling the SS system in ways that might involve some privatization, or at least that choice, was suggested by Paul Ryan and other GOP members, but they said that any changes would not involve anyone who was retired or within 10 years of retirement. I'd have been interested in hearing their details, but it seems these plans were boo'ed and the players discredited by the left before the plans ever saw the light of day.
I'm a SS recipient, although I still pay into it ( at 14-something%) as I do contract work, but I've always said I would be willing to take less than I get, or forego the COLA raises, if it would make the program viable for longer so that younger folks could be assured that what they're paying into would be there for them too. I'd also be happy to forego Medicare if I could have the health insurance we paid so generously for when we were working, but they told me it was Medicare for me when I retired, and of course there's the little detail about all the Medicare deductions taken out of our ( mine and my husband's) paychecks for 40+ years (also taken from my contract pay). I don't think those cuts amount to much and likely wouldn't save the program, but it might be a start.
I don't know too many younger folks, let's say those under 50, who are optimistic about the future of SS as it stands now, and I've heard most of them opine that it won't be there at all when they're ready for it. If I were in that boat, I'd certainly listen to other options, including privatization if it comes to that.
Possibly, I guess the devil would be in the details. Or possibly set it up so that folks can choose between the public and private systems?
I believe that overhauling the SS system in ways that might involve some privatization, or at least that choice, was suggested by Paul Ryan and other GOP members, but they said that any changes would not involve anyone who was retired or within 10 years of retirement. I'd have been interested in hearing their details, but it seems these plans were boo'ed and the players discredited by the left before the plans ever saw the light of day.
I'm a SS recipient, although I still pay into it ( at 14-something%) as I do contract work, but I've always said I would be willing to take less than I get, or forego the COLA raises, if it would make the program viable for longer so that younger folks could be assured that what they're paying into would be there for them too. I'd also be happy to forego Medicare if I could have the health insurance we paid so generously for when we were working, but they told me it was Medicare for me when I retired, and of course there's the little detail about all the Medicare deductions taken out of our ( mine and my husband's) paychecks for 40+ years (also taken from my contract pay). I don't think those cuts amount to much and likely wouldn't save the program, but it might be a start.
I don't know too many younger folks, let's say those under 50, who are optimistic about the future of SS as it stands now, and I've heard most of them opine that it won't be there at all when they're ready for it. If I were in that boat, I'd certainly listen to other options, including privatization if it comes to that.
I'm a younger person, and I would love to see SS move to some form a 401K matching system (the government would match up to x amount each year to what you put in; can be part of the employer provided 401 or Roth IRA plans to maximize the amount and power of compound interest). Leave the payroll tax on my generation for a few more years (along with changes to the benefits for the older generation) if you want to help build up the reserves for the older generation, but allow those under age x to switch to the new system and redirected their previously taxed income into these types of vehicles.
I'm a younger person, and I would love to see SS move to some form a 401K matching system (the government would match up to x amount each year to what you put in; can be part of the employer provided 401 or Roth IRA plans to maximize the amount and power of compound interest). Leave the payroll tax on my generation for a few more years (along with changes to the benefits for the older generation) if you want to help build up the reserves for the older generation, but allow those under age x to switch to the new system and redirected their previously taxed income into these types of vehicles.
How will you overcome the fact that most Americans are woefully ignorant as to how to invest sensibly in their existing 401k/similar employer plans? Which investment firm will win this prize, and how much will they charge their captive customers?
letting the public invest their own money would be the same disaster that happens when they play financial adviser with their 401k money and have no clue what they are doing.
How will you overcome the fact that most Americans are woefully ignorant as to how to invest sensibly in their existing 401k/similar employer plans? Which investment firm will win this prize, and how much will they charge their captive customers?
And that is why the FedGov has held meetings over the past several years about this.
Congress, the DOL and the new Consumer Protection Agency.
The gist of their meetings is that the government will take ownership and invest in Treasuries and in return guarantee you an annuity.
All you have to do is hand it over to them.
The DOL meeting was 3 days long.
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