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I don't think the average person is going to do okay in retirement, but SS has become so mismanaged and people have, unfortunately, come to see it as their main or sole retirement solution.
There are many, many people out there who didn't save amply, probably on the logic SS would take care of them.
True and they never saved or had reserves for most if not all of their lives in some cases.
Quote:
One persistent feature of the conservative attack on Social Security, and especially on the emerging campaign to increase benefits, is the notion that the typical American will do just fine in retirement just as it is.
Andrew G. Biggs of the pro-business American Enterprise Institute has been especially vocal on the topic in recent weeks, with articles in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and Forbes appearing all since just before Christmas. The pieces overlap in their treatment of the theme, which is succinctly defined by the headline in the Journal: "New Evidence on the Phony 'Retirement Crisis.'"
How can conservatives say that with straight faces when statistics say otherwise?
Their analysis of the data as presented in the multiple articles they publish on the topic. If we have a conservative WH, Senate and House it will become the mainstream thrust of policy in all probability.
Sorry TurboP, I didn't read closely, it's not you, it's my general disliking for the latimes. I think I meant get them as a daily paper.
This is what I've heard recently on the news. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/21/bu...tent.html?_r=0
That is a very true and accurate article on the Times and their corporate and LA politics. Part of my interest in the Times is that I am a Dodger fan and because they are a West Coast publication their news sequencing/updating tends to run later in the day than East Coast publications. They do have some good articles and perspective to agree or disagree with.
The social security tax rate is 6.2% to the maximum taxable base. The additional 1.45% medicare tax is UNLIMITED.
Yes. You are right. Since 1994, the FICA-HI tax was on an unlimited gross income. Thanks for catching that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Larry Siegel
that counts as "workers" people who worked very little, including people like my wife who only paid in for 11 years. She gets about $900 a month. But she does not have to live on $900 a month!
It's likely that her $900/month amounts to a fine return on the money she put in.
Quote:
By waiting to 70 my wife and I will receive in excess of $4,300 in social security benefits alone for over $51,600.
It's likely that your $4,300/month amounts to a crappy return on the money youse put in.
For the person making North of $120k in gross wages, that crappiness declines as a person goes North of $200k and $300k and so on.
Many SS reformers want to tax all of that money. I wonder what is going to happen when the government starts issuing 5-figure checks on a monthly basis? -- I know! They will "cap" all benefits on incomes that are over the median ( not average ) to that median or less.
It's already headed there right now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HappyTexan
And the story always ends the same way...only government can save you from yourself.
The alternative is that we have people who got to spend that 6.2% on whatever they wanted who are a potent political force who just want to confiscate all the 401(k) and IRA assets because "it's not fair" that those people are living better in retirement than me.
Given those choices, I choose having the money confiscated from me now and partially returned to me later, but letting me keep my IRA money. It's mine! mine! mine!
Unfortunately, I think there will be an IRA/401(k)/403(b) tax on balances that are deemed "excessive." It will happen before I take my first RMD. Some of my relatives will partially be at fault. ... sorry ...
It's already headed there right now.
The alternative is that we have people who got to spend that 6.2% on whatever they wanted who are a potent political force who just want to confiscate all the 401(k) and IRA assets because "it's not fair" that those people are living better in retirement than me.
Given those choices, I choose having the money confiscated from me now and partially returned to me later, but letting me keep my IRA money. It's mine! mine! mine!
I have seen this "story" occasionally that "the government" ?wants? to take peoples' 401k and IRA money. Where did this nonsense get started?
I have seen this "story" occasionally that "the government" ?wants? to take peoples' 401k and IRA money. Where did this nonsense get started?
It gets started by watching political rhetoric and current events. Anyone that hasn't read something about this needs to get out more.
In 1986, tax reform got rid of a host of different rates and jillion deductions, yet revenues from the wealthiest increased with lower rates and lots of low(er) income taxpayers dropped-off. Over time, we've more than doubled the brackets, there is talk of hugely increasing SocSec benefits ... lots more ... maybe you can think of more stuff ..
The idea that the government looks at revenue "sources" as somehow different is nuts.
The government wants more and more of your money. Pension funds for pretty-much all larger cities and states are never going to be adequately funded without more of ( your ) money. Where is it going to come from?
One place that "no one" is going to be to mad about is tax-deferred retirement accounts of people with more than $XXX in them. First, $XXX starts way North of where most people have their balances - say - $1 million and then works its way down. Pretty soon, anyone getting more than $xxx out of their accounts in any given year will be "contributing" their "fair share."
Did you ever read Animal Farm?
I agree with: "The trouble with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money." --Margaret Thatcher. ( for the pedants, I know that's not an exact quote )
there is talk of hugely increasing SocSec benefits ... lots more ... maybe you can think of more stuff ..
Do the math. It ain't possible. It will require pretty big tax hikes just to keep benefits where they are now.
The economic reality is that Social Security needs to be cash flow neutral or it chokes everything else in the Federal budget. It's already cash flow negative and is only cash flow positive by bookkeeping slight of hand where the Federal Government is paying "interest" to the Social Security Trust Fund. There will be both broad based payroll tax hikes and a big upwards shift of the cap within the next few years. It's going to happen no matter what kind of rhetoric the DC elite spew. Retired people and near-retired people vote and it's an express ride to being an unemployed ex-Congressman or ex-Senator if you screw those voters.
I think that what's going to happen is that the poor under the age of 65 get squeezed. Section 8 housing gets diverted to house the elderly. Medicaid benefits get slashed. Poor people don't vote and very few politicians are going to oppose any of that happening.... particularly when the states are going broke paying the other 50% of the Medicaid bill.
The thread title is the title of an article in today's Washington Post. It says, among other things:
And,
The article also suggested (backed by data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) that when government retirement programs like Social Security offer more generous benefits, people tend to do less -- in addition to those government retirement programs -- to prepare financially for retirement.
Nonsense. First, Social Security is solvent currently, and will remain so for the next 10 or so years. It is paid for. After then, it will still be able to pay benefits. All that will happen at that time is that the output will start exceeding the input. Doesn't mean it's out of money or insolvent.
This situation will be corrected in one or two ways:
1. It will correct itself in the next generation, when the younger people, who are not many in number, start retiring, and their benefits are paid by the new workers, much larger in number.
2. SS will be tweaked again, as it has been tweaked in the past.
It is Medicare that is in trouble. Not Social Security.
People have worked and contributed to Social Security. It is not welfare.
I'm tired of hearing people complain about the program. It was created because there was a need for it, since many of our seniors were suffering in dire poverty after working a lifetime. Social Security has been successful and alleviated that suffering to a large degree. If only other govt programs were as successful.
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