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Let’s cut to the chase here. Social Security doesn’t need a fix to make it keep helping seniors, even according to the very conservative estimates of the Social Security trustees, which state that Social Security:
- Will take in more money than it is spending until 2017
- Including interest on the SS trust fund, not be spending more money than its income till 2028
- Not run out of money till 2041
Benefit cuts are actually pushed a fair bit into the future, and wouldn’t occur under Obama’s first term, as I understand the Diamond-Orszag plan, so Social Security "reform," from the point of view of the administration, would be more about upping the balance of cash coming in. It’s not clear that the administration wants any Social Security reform (or, that after the furor over it, they would still want it), but if they do, well, perhaps the reason might be money.
"Reforming" Social Security is something which will use up a great deal of political capital. So, if the administration decides to proceed either they think that a problem that doesn’t exist except in the long term (and perhaps not at all)—"Social Security not being able to pay benefits"— is urgent enough to waste huge amounts of political capital on, or they want the money. I really don’t see any other possibility. Perhaps I’m missing something, but this is where the logic leads me.
I would suggest that a better way to raise money would be to raise marginal tax rates on the wealthy, but the administration may not feel it can get the one additional, necessary Republican Senator (once Franken is seated) to vote with the Majority.
On the other hand, a coalition of Blue Dog Dems and Republicans are always a threat to pass a regressive tax on ordinary people.
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ZED!
why are no democrats, and especially, why are there no bloggers yelling at the top of their lungs that we INSIST on getting the money back that was
stolenborrowed by reagan?we nees some outrage ian, if we go on the attack instead of playing defense there’s a far better chance obama stops this mad grab for my parents investments, my money and my kids future
It is a temptingly large pile of money. We need to push back so they don’t even dare thinking of tapping it.
The social security embezzlers want the botton 80% to pay for the top 20%, there problem is that there isn’t enough money in social security to do that. The only way out of this is to raise the top marginal rates.
Ian, wouldn’t cutting social security benefits be anti-stimulative?
Would the cuts be kicked far enough into the future not to matter? If so, why would they be anxious to fiddle with ss if they wouldn’t “find” any money there for some time into the future?
They want the money.
They used “Social Security Reform” in the St Ronnie years to take the money under the guise of “protecting social security”.
Now it appears, they just want to complete the theft.
(returning to corner while adjusting the tin-foil chapeau)
diehard!
;))
Seconded.
Simple answer is Conservatives just HATE Social Security and want to end it as we know it. They would like to see all that money in the market so they can make a profit from it! Do you Trust Wall Street and the Big Bankers with “Your” money?Just look at your 401K… Lose any thing?? Leave my Social Security alone! It can be fixed by having no top stop on the SS tax.
You can DIGG IT right here!
why are no democrats, and especially, why are there no bloggers yelling at the top of their lungs that we INSIST on getting the money back that was stolen borrowed by reagan?, Well I think FDL has been doing a good job of tracking this and so has Open Left. Eschaton has chimed in a few times. The rest can’t wrap their head around the idea that Obama would do something like this.
Thanks Ian. digg is open.
Who Me???? LOL
WTF is BO thinking? Is there not one f’ing politician on this planet that gives a flying fuck about the average person. I don’t know how other people fared with their 401K, but I lost 7 years of savings in three days. I am so sick of these rotten fuckers taking every damn thing I have worked my ass off for. (Spit)
Dugg
they are so good at their bill naming strategy
“clean air bill” that allows industry to pour their bronchitis in my kids air and their cancer in my moms water
“no child left behind” which underfunds education so public schools fail
“the patriot act” plaguerised directly from hitler’s “enabling act”
“help america vote” which made it mandatory to use machines that they could easily flip
the democrats needs them some of that marketing strategy
Dept. of the obvious: fiscal responsibility is just a code for taking money away from workers. If there were really about reducing federal expenditures, they would be insisting on a single payer solution.
let’s offer them a simple fix .. we can get them to double the number of people represented by the house members ..and cut the number of congressmen/women in half .. and then we can cut each state to one senator .. and viola.. we’ve saved half the salaries we pay out .. half the pensions ..and halved the medical costs of the legislative branch ..
what a savings eh .. not to mention the reduction on greenhouse gasses being generated by the bullshit spouted by the half we’re “letting go” .. let’s pink slip the bastards ..
the way to push back is to go on the attack, being on defense is not going to do the trick
we need something like;
“we need to get the funds back that reagan “borrowed” and we need to make sure the people who have those assets are not dead beats, they have to pay back that loan PRONTO because “social security needs fixing”
man, I BET they shut their faces about how much it needs fixing if they get the idea we are gonna try to get our money back from them as a method of fixing the “problem”
So Ian, why would Obama need the money this year? Why not wait until after the 2010 election, where D senate prospects look good, and raise taxes on the rich after that?
Remarkably, they are forced to say that they are against the Fairness Doctrine.
Ahh, the ultimate pyramid scheme, social security. I love it!
sorry, interrupting with spin from Ensign (R-Gambling)
“government caused this problem, government can’t get us out”. wow.
msnbc.
Obama does not need the money, the hedge funds who funded his early money need that money.
we finally had a bill with good naming, who wrote that bill and who named it?
well done
Isn’t it weird how teh goopers HATE things they WANT? I think they really hate is that someone else is getting something.
My wingnut used to complain like crazy about seniors until he became one himself. He loves his senior discounts, handicapped parking, and yes! Social Security, Medicare and all that good stuff. so yummy.
That would be the US Government.
googled and I read now it wasn’t a bill it evolved, first from not allowing political opinion then to allowing it only if the other side was given equal opportunity to offer rebuttal
I don’t know who wrote it (many years ago–different critters), but I have heard a few R’s screaming about how they do not want to bring back the Fairness Doctrine. Makes me chuckle.
no, it would be the recipients of the tax gifts reagan made of middle class assets
if we broke up the media again, and really did have a divergence of opinion, I bet they would be screaming for it.
If I bet you on that, I’d lose. Heh.
I understand what you are saying, but the official signatory on the loan papers is the US Government.
So it is up to the US Government to re-claim the money they took from Social Security and gave to the plutocrats/used to off-set the Reagan deficits in the general fund.
OT, Chris Matthews talking to Howard Dean about Obama’s healthcare proposal on Hardball. Matthews endorses Dean for HHS.
The Sunshine family would love this plan with a medicare selection option. Will be watching the progress of this, working for it, too.
And yeah, Dean’s my choice for HHS, too.
Hilda confirmed!!!
i don’t see how this could possibly be about the fiscal implications of SS. but when i see larry summers involved, and i look at what he has done to other countries when they were in economic distress (see structural adjustment, see shock therapy), i see a pattern.
This just in from the Department of Naive Questions:
If one wished to access current data re SS, e.g., dollars in the fund now; dollars outgoing in each of the next, oh, 10 years; dollars flowing into the fund in each of the next, oh, 10 years, where would one look?
Or, if one were lazy, where would one find credible details about all of this in digest form?
Actually, Social Security isn’t a pyramid scheme. If it were a fraud, it would be a Ponzi scheme (paying off earlier investors with proceeds from current investors.) But it’s not a Ponzi scheme, either.
Why not? Because the government has the sovereign power to levy taxes. As long as the Federal Government is willing to levy taxes to support SS benefits, it’s not a fraud scheme at all.
Go to wikipedia and type in “pyramid scheme”, it should have some links to SS data….
ya, it’s up to them to get it but if we yell and scream that we want the “short fall” that obama makes believe it has to come from the “reagan loans” then they shut up about those “short falls”
Yes to Dr. Dean!!!
Show us the balance sheet, someone.
So basically, what you’re saying is that it’s structured as a ponzi scheme (which where I’m from is the same as a pyramid scheme) where new investors (young people) pay old ones (retirees), except it’s legal because it’s the government controlling it instead of Madoff? Really? Because the government can force new people to invest? That doesn’t change the structure of the plan.
see Christy for more
Assets: $0
Liabilities: $999999999999999999999
Completely OT: Tried your chili recipe and it totally rocked! Thanks for posting it.
found some of it, maybe all
I agree.
My bet is ‘they’ will try and start with taking a percentage of contributions somehow, and saying it’s to be invested in IRA’s, 401k’s, etc. as a means to ’stimulate’ the markets AND to ‘enhance’ retirement potentials.
We all know how THAT stuff usually works out. Sooner than later, there’s NO money for SS, it’s shut down and we ALL are at the mercy of unregulated market forces for our retirement futures.
‘They’ never stop reaching for ‘our’ sweat equity and wallets.
And yes, there should be a HUGE outcry across the nation if this administration even THINKS about tweaking SS before fixing health care issues, nationalizing the banks, transportation and energy sectors.
Hey, a social activist can dream, no? ;-)
If all the young people leave the country, and all you have left are retirees, you get $0 tax revenue for SS because 0 people are paying taxes. It is not an endless supply of revenue. Just Madoff strong-arming the investors in instead of lying to them, no difference in the structure of the program.
SS is not an investment. It’s a transfer payment, same as welfare, medicare, medicaid.
It’s my impression that the money is in treasury bills, or something similar that collects interest, even if it’s not at a high rate.
Something a lot safer for all of us ‘investors’ than Wall Street, anyway.
That’s what makes the SS-crisis-pushers unhappy: they see the possibility of big profits for them and their Wall Street buddies if they can get hold of enough of that money.
The real economists, like Krugman and Roubini, know that the market can’t handle that kind of money.
Yes, in a redictio ad absurdum world, you get an absurd result. If all the young people left the U.S., SS would be the least of our worries.
I’m just excited about switching my lightbulbs to save power while I plug in my Chevy Volt every night to charge its massive battery! Yeah for promoting massive increases in energy consumption! Go Volt!
Exactly, how the heck do you think Madoff paid off the old investors over time? TRANSFER PAYMENT.
So what mythical country would all of those young people go to, and what would happen to all the seniors who are working and paying into SS? You might want to think in real-world terms here.
I agree. This may be about money but it is definitely about ideology.
The Social Security Administration’s website is a good place to look.
Why do people continue to omit that Orszag’s proposal INCREASES benefits to low earners – to poverty level by 2012 and beyond poverty level thereafter.
Increasing benefits for low earners is a moral imperative. Expecting a minimum wage earner to live on $785/month when he’s 69 years old in 2030 is an abomination and we need to get that number up now.
You’re missing the entire point ecahn. He was trying to imply that because they’re the government that the new tax revenue available to them is endless, which it is not. I took it to the extreme, but lets say you doubled FICA contributions? Do you think that everyone would just stick around and pay the bill? Point of diminishing returns.. where is it? no idea, but it’s there somewhere.
Here’s another example, biodieselvw. Many of us think the best way to get the tax revenues the govt needs is to raise tax rates on the rich (to transfer some of their wealth to other uses that voters think are more useful). Now suppose all the wealthy left the country, much more realistic than if all the young left. Where would the govt revenue be then? Does that mean we shouldn’t tax the rich at higher rates?
Madoff does not have the power to tax.
Now if you are against taxing workers at rates high enough to support SS, then just say so.
since 1982 part of it was supposed to be an investment – maybe investment is not the right word, but there was a manufactured surplus that is supposed to be available to cover decades of projected deficits.
Please to to the point of diminishing returns and stay there.
it’s neither pyrimid nor ponzi
it pays for itself, those that invest payed into it more then they get out
it’s forced savings, not ponzi nor pyrmimid
Dam Double DIIGGING again!! Oh well EG we do support the LAke!
Historically revenues go up dramatically in the short term if you cut rates on the rich because it brings greater incentive for investment (specifically capital gains tax).
Yes, if you tax the rich too much they will leave the US or not invest in the US. It happens all the time, especially with corporations.
Has the troll been fed enough yet?
biodieselvw doesn’t believe in taxes. He thinks there’s a miracle involved in having roads, military, police, fire depts, mail delivery and all those other socialist benefits we have as a country.
Why the rich are rich because they deserve it by the luck of their birth and the only reason the poor folks are poor is because the ten year olds aren’t out working full time jobs, pulling themselves up by the boot straps like folks like George Bush did.
See PJ Evans comment.
The Social Security Trust Fund holds U.S. Treasury Certificates. They are non-transferable. What they really are is a promise from the present (and former) governments of the United States to be drawn against future revenues.
In 220 or so years (since the adoption of the Constitution) the U.S. Government has never defaulted on a debt. If it were possible, and you wanted to swap your share of the SSTF for my IRA (which was pretty conservatively invested and still tanked) I’d trade you $10 of your share of the SSTF for $1 of my IRA. If you don’t like that ratio, tell me what ratio you do like. But you have to discount it, and heavily, because you clearly think so little of it.
Correction: Please go to the point of diminishing returns and stay there. oops.
it’s not supposed to be an investment it’s supposed to be a savings, it should also get the same return on savings as other savings accounts
I consider my bank account one of my investments
It’s not structured as a Ponzi scheme. It is an intergenerational transfer scheme. Every social security programme in the world is structured that way, because when the schemes were opened, the first beneficiaries (old people) could not have contributed. The whole point of the schemes was to provide income for poor old people who had not earned enough in their lifetime to support themselves, and for whom family assistance was not sufficient. If you project the scheme to infinity, which is the analytically correct thing to do, it is balanced.
Any savings and dissavings process involves intergenerational transfer. If you pay off your mortgage and sell your home to pay for a nursing home, you are involved in an intergenerational transfer. You saved in your earning years, and somebody else younger than you transfers resources to you in your old age. But the difference is there’s no guarantee, as we have seen with respect to the current generation who expected to live in a nice sunbelt gated community off their ill-gotten capital gains. You might say, but the people with houses put the money up front. That is true, but it doesn’t mean it’s coming out the back end. And you put your money up front when you paid into Social Security.
To repeat, it is not a Ponzi scheme. It is a non-voluntary savings scheme.
I think I said that perris. ’tain’t a pyramid scheme, nor a Ponzi scheme.
This is where bright woman knows she’s in over her head (as happens most days at about this time), and bids y’all adieu! *g*
No, it is a transfer payment. It is not an invesment. I don’t get an asset when I pay in. Maybe if they actually gave me some t-bills in return then I would agree with you. But my contribution goes right out the door to the retiree, not “invested” in anything.
Tax revenue is not endless. But all of govt spending is a transfer payment. We pay a lot of taxes that get transferred to the military. Does that mean we shouldn’t have a military because tax revenue is not endless. It’s all a fight over the allocation of tax dollars, within a budget that is not very constrained. It’s not analytically helpful to single out one part and look at how it’s financed. Probably the SS designers set a false way of thinking about it when they started it with a separate tax. I’m not that familiar with the history, but I think it might have been a convenient way of placating some whose votes were needed. But SS has never been run as a standalone program. Taxes are fungible, no matter what they are called. (Think they may be doing same with highway “trust fund” but it’s been awhile since I looked at it.)
They can leave the country, but they can’t leave the IRS. I speak from experience. You never lose your tax liability unless you hide the income. I note that 52,000 Americans with Swiss bank accounts are learning that to their great dismay and potential financial crucifixion.
Right. That’s what they said. That’s how it was sold. But taxes are fungible. So that’s not what they do.
as I said, it’s paid for to the payers by themselves, I payed all my life and what I get out of it will not be what I put into it
some people pay into it and never get anything out of it
the only pre-requisit is that we do not lose our ability to procreate, it does not count on an increasing population it only counts on another generation
oops, never mind then
No exactly sure what you are looking for:
If you scroll half way down you will see a table of inflow and outflow projections 2008-2017
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/trsummary.html
This is a quick historical version up to 2006
http://www.ssa.gov/history/trustfunds.html
This page section IV tables gives a lot projections out to 2032
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ssir/SSI08/ssiLOT.html
an ideology that magically aligns with personal interest?
Hahaha, so you think they just pay everyone with the interest off of those t-bills? No no no, that’s not how it works. Some is transferred, some is in t-bills, that ratio turns towards pure transfer payments in 2041 (as reported in this blog).
It is NOT savings. It’s a transfer payment.
The intial recipients, until some very recent years, got a lot more out of SS than they ever would have received had they used their payroll taxes to buy an annuity.
It’s a transfer payment, and the inputs and outputs are determined by politics.
If it were an “investment” shouldn’t it transfer with my death? I don’t remember being able to give my social security benefits to a beneficiary….
According to a friend who worked on pension reform with Orszag under Stiglitz at the World Bank: “Peter along with his brother Michael who lives in the UK are both pension experts and both concluded (along with MIT pension expert Peter Diamond who later wrote a Brookings book on it with Peter) that there was no crisis with SS. Tweaking here and there, but no crisis.”
The following is from a paper by Orszag and Diamond five years ago:
I don’t get why a lot of us run around talking about government wanting to cut benefits. The Diamond Orszag proposal increases benefits at the low end, with potential tax increases and benefit cuts at the high end.
We’re progressives. Giving more money to poor people NOW is something we should be applauding, even as we agitate against the potential cuts at the high end in 2025 or later.
No more old folks eating cat food because their benefit is too low.
We should be shouting about the proposed increase in low earners benefits.
What time’s the speech? 8?
I just want them to stop trying to call Social Security an investment. Lets call it what it is. It’s a portion of income tax revenue that is spent on welfare for retirees and the disabled. It is NOT an investment.
What time does Obama address Congress. I don’t see it on my teebee guide.
Could you link to that? Someone else asserted that in the last couple of days and then someone disputed it. I did not track down which was accurate.
what they do now. thank you LBJ.
I owe a drink.
The troll wants to play word games.
Thank you. I feel like I’m the only one that has read that paer around here, everyone else is so focused on the possible payroll tax increase or high end benefit cut.
There are surviver benefits paid by SSA. Say a stay at home parent and the SS wage earner dies, then there are benefits paid to the surviver.
There are also benefits paid to children of deceased under SSA.
Plus benefits paid to those who become disabled.
So yes, the benefits are “transferable.” You just have to accept the benefits being paid by law, not by your designation.
It’s a transfer payment, just like military spending is. If you prefer, call them both welfare payments.
Well, at least I know where Geithner got his term “legacy loans” from to replace my term “crap assets.”
Also, designating exactly what the program is may also help your cause. SS is welfare for old people. Limit it to the truly needy. The revenues required would drop, everyone would see their effective rate drop, and the only people missing anything are the rich that don’t get their beer money every week.
It is my understanding that the social security surplus was invested in U.S. government bonds.
Nine
it’s in this paper, about 1/3 of the way down. Here’s the relevant passage:
I doubt that LBJ was the first.
Thanks. I keep forgetting we have a west coast. *g*
Thanks for clearing that up for me.
i’m getting caught up in the weeds here…. stepping back for a moment…..
1. we’re in the midst of a global economic crisis. we have a climate crisis and a resource crisis coming.
2. changing SS is not, at this moment, anywhere near the top of policy issues that need to be addressed. in fact, it looks to be pretty low on the list.
3. what the fuck are they thinking of?
If a person’s parents die and they’re an adult they get $0 even though their parents may have never received any money from SS and only paid in. That is NOT transferable. You only get paid if you’re a child or disabled.
Up until 1983 there were benefits for dependents in college – I was one of them (my father died in 1970, I received OASI benefits from 1978-1983 as an emancipated minor in college – age 17-22).
After 1983 dependent benefits were cut entirely for those over age 18.
I trimmed out part of their explanation of “legacy debt.” Here is the rest of it:
Heh. Standing in front of the WH at night, one of the lighted windows makes it look like Donovan is wearing a diamond earring.
Shiny object to hide the hammer Obama’s gonna hit the Rethugs with tonight?
YOu just stated your benefits were not transferable. I pointed out the place where you were wrong.
And yes, if one is an adult when parents die, the only benefit is the death benefit of I believe $255.
Exactly, the surplus, not the rest. The rest is just sent to the retirees. Hence, TRANSFER PAYMENT.
Yes, we used to talk about the welfare of the country as a good thing but now if you label a program welfare it’s a bad thing. And how investing in our elders so that they can lead lives in greater security, less poverty, less fear is not an investment both in them and our country, I don’t know.
I’ll second that. Raising holy hell from a paper written in 2003 when the world was a very different place. Just. Plain. Nuts.
Yeah. WTF are they thinking? Is there some kind of quid pro quo, health care in exchange for “ss reform”? I’m perplexed.
think he was – put it all under the unified budget. my old link on this is dead, so i’ll have to go google it unless anyone else has the details.
Jane’s coming up on Shuster. After the break.
I can appreciate that response.
So lets call SS what it is. Welfare for retirees, children who lose their parents, and the disabled. Then lets throw it into income tax and remove some of the inefficiences of government.
I have three hypotheses:
– Ian’s hypothesis is that they want to build a bigger surplus that they can borrow by investing it in government bonds.
– there is the shock-doctrine hypothesis that the right-wingers want to realize their long-term goal of getting rid of social security.
– there is the obvious desire of those in the financial services industry to get all that money flowing through their hands.
Ah, yes, was that the transition quarter? No, that was some other budgetary gimmick.
I wasn’t referring to SS specifically, but to the time honored war of changing spending around for political reasons. You were naive if you think just because they called it a SS tax, that’s all it would be used for. If it weren’t LBJ, it would have been Nixon. They had a war to finance.
One more
-there are the people that are sick of paying so much of their hard earned money in so Octomom can get checks to go to Nordstrom’s since her kids have ADD.
i wish.
Jane’s up.
i’m for holding politicians accountable for what they actually do. lbj doesn’t get a pass from me just because nixon would have tried to do the same thing if lbj hadn’t.
Actually, I think it was Reagan who first used SS surplus to offset General Fund deficits. Prior to that, it was kept (at least budget wise) as a separate entity.
And I recall that for a few years after it first happened, some of the more honest reporters would report “this is the deficit with Social Security included in revenues and this is the deficit without Social Security” but that faded as the ’80s progressed.
Fair enough.
No, it was LBJ, SS Act of 1965.
Are those legacy costs in real or nominal dollars I wonder? Also it really doesn’t matter about legacy debt as long as more money is coming in than going out, or money coming in is equal to money going out.
I mean I kind of get the idea that Orszag is fudging on this. He talks about this legacy debt but overlooks the commitment which the SS surpluses represent.
Those btw are spent as BCT noted above in exchange the US submitted to SS special non-transferable certificates, interest bearing IOUs basically which SS could trade for money as needed.
“Also it really doesn’t matter about legacy debt as long as more money is coming in than going out, or money coming in is equal to money going out.” that’s what Madoff said….
I’ll go with option two, but add that both Democrats and Republicans would like to crimp SS to keep more money in discretionary spending that they can spend as they want.
You sound like some refugee from the Reagan era when welfare queens had so much money they subsidized the US auto industry. These distinctions you keep making seem to have some importance to you but there doesn’t seem to be any substance to them. Social Security is now most people’s principal retirement plan and hedge against old age poverty. Are you into old people being poor and fearful?
found it, google is my friend. from the SSA website:
it gets a lot more complicated after this, but i think this is the first time that there was one budget number that included SS. am happy to be corrected if i have it wrong.
You really don’t understand much about economics do you? You have this erroneous model which you apply to Social Security both in terms of its purpose and operation. Since SS doesn’t fit into this, you think there is something wrong with SS. But there isn’t, it’s your model that is faulty.
or
let’s call it what it really is;
“a savings plan”
operating FAR more efficiently then private plans could POSSIBLY operate, it would then have to bear the pressure of golden parachutes, corporate jets and “meetings” in the most expensive resorts on the planet
as far as “remove the inefficiencies of government”, you are SO propagandized you don’t even realize how foolish that statement is
government is FAR more efficient at administering the commons then private industry, look at black water, look at bottled water, look at private schools, look at the roads, the bridges the parks
you’ve come to the wrong place if you think propaganda works here
sorry i missed your earlier comment. i’m not far from your option 2:
except that i don’t think it’s just the right wingers, i think there are a lot of nominal dems (i hope not many in the House) like larry summers who think cutting back on social safety nets is the thing to do. all one has to do is look at usa foreign policy as run out of the treasury during the clinton years – especially when summers was treas sec.
Your right they want our money and want to quit paying as little as they can get away with. No one is conplaining or doing anything about it and soon we will all find ourselves paying more taxes getting less benefits and not be able to collect until were ninty.
The time to act is now before they commit the crime of fixing S.S. and Mmedicare.
They could pay for these things with well designed lotteries with lots of small prizes so people win once in a while to keep playing. It’s just to simple and they would rather raise taxes than actually doing something that would fund these programs into the future.
It may be their principle retirement “plan”, but it is not their principle retirement income (for the majority). The problem with creating this view that SS is an investment discourages proper retirement planning. By changing the culture so that people don’t see SS as their primary retirement option, but rather as a safety net (as it is intended), you would encourage people to plan properly for their retirement.
he is under the impression everything he’s heard from his his side of the aisle is true.
pity but it is what it is
he is also under the WRONG impression that the country does better under the ideas of “libertarian” anarchists, he actually believe the country does better letting “the market decide”
as if “the market” can do anything right at all without regulations, as if “the market” even exists without regultatons.
hopefully he didn’t come here to preach but to learn, if he came to preach, education is innoculation from preachers of false information
if e came to learn, he’s got a lot of catching up to do
Give me a break perris, government is horribly inefficient, it always has been. Many corporations are too! I’m not doubting that! Oh, and the government workers have private planes, fancy getaways, etc. too, it’s just not disclosed.
I didn’t know this went back to Johnson. The media and politicians still use the off-budget numbers when they talk about deficits, i.e. with SS surpluses counted in. (The two biggest contributors of off-budget revenue are SS and the Post Office with SS comprising something like about 98% of the total. So for short hand, the SS surplus is the off-budget contribution.) These numbers were fairly small but after the 1983 SS reform changes under Alan Greenspan, SS surpluses began to increase rapidly by the late 80s and have continued to do so to the present time.
Actually since the demise of defined benefit plans, it IS the primary source of retirement income for many individuals.
401ks/SEP-IRAs and such just don’t offer as much income.
So, it is beyond safety net, and therefore is the retirement income most are left with.
If the Trust Fund is not going to be repaid, we need to immediately rename the Social Security tax to “stealth income tax” because that is really what it represents.
Here’s an idea: immediately eliminate the Social Security tax on individuals, collecting the employer portion only until the entire Trust Fund is repaid via the income tax. Thereafter, collect only enough payroll tax to cover current outlays. Remove from the system programs such as SSI that don’t directly benefit those who paid SS taxes for sufficient quarters, and fund these via general income taxes.
I have no idea where you heard this but there is NOBODY I know who thought ss would be their only retirement plan
it so happens when their “privitized” plans collapsed or failed WE are lucky enough that they put funds into ss
otherwise you and I would be forced into paying their bills
unless of course you think they should just bundle up and die
which of course plenty of people believe, that once you pass the age of productivity you should just die
however letting that happen would hurt you financially far more then making sure they didn’t die on the streets.
but that’s long term planning some people are not capable
Since 1983, federal workers have been full participants in Social Security (prior to that, they paid in for Medicare) and the old Civil Service Plan did include payments by the worker.
Now they have “access” to a fed employee version of a 401K (403?)
Perris, you’re under the “same” impression, everyone has to get their information somewhere. Just because FDL researched it, or Fox news researched it, or Krugman said it, etc. does not make it true. Everyone is biased. I also never said that the market does not need regulations. Don’t put words in my mouth.
Elitist left winger not wanting to discuss, just wants to attack and give high fives to his fellow socialists. Are you ready to bow to your dear leader tonight perris?
so, you really WERE serious when you said that?
you have been totally brainwashed indeed
let’s see if I can come up with some examples;
oh, never mind, I did, I did it in the post you referred to, please go back and read it again for those examples
private industry has the “inneficiency” of needing a profit
there is a profit model not a serice model and therefore FAR more inefficient even IF you consider the “100 dollar hammer”.
there is FAR more waste privitizing the commons, far.
however, of course corporate owned media has you convinced corporate profit is somehow more efficient
I can’t blame you, it’s very easy to fall for corporate media propaganda
however most people are now imune, you will be too…if you tune in often enough to overcome those brainwashing technieques
Link for that?
I agree. *g*
How does one plan for retirement nowadays. Well there’s pension funds. Wait pretty much all the companies have bailed on them. Still there are 401ks, except going into a depression they are shrinking faster than the Amazing Shrinking Woman. Good thing, some people, not everyone, have their houses to fall back on. Rats, that collapsed too. So yes, people should plan better for retirement. I mean look at all their options.
You forgot the piece that drives their efficiency. It’s called COMPETITION! Ahhhh Perris, did Rachel not explain that one to you last night???? Every had a lemonade stand? It’s the perfect analogy.
you’re right of course, we all get our information somewhere
so, let’s look at bottled water, let’s look at black water, let’s look at parks, let’s look at roads, let’s look at the police, let’s look at the fire dept, let’s look at education, let’s look at levees
the list is enless, “the commons” costs much more privitized then public, it isn’t even close
this is becuase oposite common belief, with private industry price is NOT based on the cost to produce it is based on what people will pay, public service is based against price and service
private industry can NOT produce as efficiently as the public sector when it comes to the commons, can not happen
alan greenspan’s fingerprints again.
Hugh, what if instead of using our contribution they just bought t-bills that we the taxpayers would own individually, then take a portion of normal income tax revenue and use that for the safety net. Then it IS an investment, and actually less risky than the current SS program. Noooo, cuz then the government couldn’t take it when I die! They’d have to give it to my beneficiary! Ahhhh, darn!
Competition? Is that what they call it when Halliburton and KBR are given no-bid contracts?
You might be correct if there were in fact true competition.
But the only competition these days is in fantasies
perris – in this country (i’m told it’s different in europe) anarchists are usually left wingers and libertarians are right wingers. they’re not the same thing at all.
Do you know why those things are cheaper in your scenario? It’s called economies of scale. It has nothing to do with who is controlling the program, it has to do with the size of it.
competition is a grea thing biodienselvw, and we finally agree
ACCEPT when it comes to the commons, then there is no competition, price decides
without ss to compete against private investment would cost even MORE then it cost now, without public schools private would be ten times what they cost now, without public water competing agianst private water you’d be paying more for water then for food
government is more efficient then private industry and this is really simple to see
private industry has to bear the pressure of profit, share holders, golden retirement, private jets, etc
lesson over for today, you have worn my fingers to the bone, come back tomorrow for more intervention against the brainwashing you’ve suffered through corporate propaganda
Government is terrible at running things compared to private business. Look at what a good job private enterprise as done with providing cheap healthcare to everyone. And those monuments to capitalism the housing bubble and financial meltdown would not have been possible if the full genius of the private sector had not been unleashed on them.
Private enterprise has always been an essential part of defense procurement too. I mean when was the last time you heard of a cost overrun.
Haha, that’s because the government was the consumer, and they’re not efficient (or in that case, they’re just corrupt).
True competition happens every day. You see subway drop their prices on sandwiches, hyundai’s assurance program, etc. Creating more benefit/$ for their consumers in order to entice more demand which will eventually drive profit.
we’ve had this discussion before selise and I agree, there are differant versions of anarchy
a “libertarian” believes in no regulation except the regulations they like
they neglect to let the people they’re in discussion with know that money itself is a regulation, as is ownership, as are the courts, as is enforcement
they want the regulations that allow them to keep their profit but they hate the regulations that force them to pay their bills
if you look up the definition of “libertarian”, it is derived from anarchy
no kidding, it really is
see all later
It’s not welfare because it is not funded via income tax, but is a specific tax levied ONLY on lower and middle class workers who deserve to receive benefits based on their contributions.
“And those monuments to capitalism the housing bubble and financial meltdown would not have been possible if the full genius of the private sector had not been unleashed on them.”
Remove “private sector”, insert GSE’s.
No, it’s levied on EVERYONE. It’s just capped for the upper class.
i think the way people use the terms to define their own beliefs should not be excluded. your description of libertarian has almost nothing to do with any anarchists i’ve ever known (other than the distrust of state power).
So someone age 64 could go out under your plan and buy his first T bill. Retire the next year. Cash it and starve the week after. Genius.
You simply don’t know what you are talking about. Your arguments have no basis in reality where you have several generations of workers working at the same time.
You think well if you just had a T bill everything would be all right. But you overlook that the same people who comprise that workforce or will comprise that workforce will be the ones to pay off your T bill. You do not seem to realize that the government is not some free floating entity divorced from people, that people paying into the system now will be receiving benefits not from some investment somewhere but by other future workers. That all of this is as much a social commitment that we make to each other to take care of each other and not some simplistic investment scheme that should be tailored to your specific needs because you think you are cleverer investor than most other workers. This is not a scheme to help make you rich in your old age. It is a system to give people some help so that old age for them can be something other than brutal and short.
What old age? We’re all supposed to die on the job. I thought you knew that…
You don’t even know your history, Bush’s ownership society, the deregulation of financial markets, the promotion of the bubble. The GSE’s were late to the party and because of their rules were uninvolved in the subprime side which private firms pushed so hard.
You really don’t know what you are talking about. You don’t have arguments. You have talking points. Most of us here do primary source research so your idea that because you speak in talking points that we do is mistaken. You are entitled to your prejudices but we are not obligated to lend them any credence.
next thing i know you’ll be saying “promote the general welfare” or something equally dangerous.
damn commie.
Ooops! Sorry, forgot.
teddy’s up: Michael Steele on Collins, Snowe & Specter: “They’re gonna have to go through a primary”
I can’t believe y’all are still feeding this pathetic troll.
the betrayal to progressivity of Obama on social security, even getting this “on the table”, let alone actually stealing from the trust of those contributing for the past 25 years of highly regressive taxation is startling. This move is not at all consistent with principles of helping the majority of Americans.
gee, in the years of that dastardly Bill Clinton, they talked of putting a “lock box” on social security. That was change we could believe in.
no question, democrats and republicans have become drunk as sailors spending the “free money” (h/t Atrios) they’ve had for 25 years with the social security surplus. Looks like Obama and his mindless minions are on-board with the greatest heist in human history.
I live on $11,000 a year–that’s a thousand more than that thief from Tyco paid for his shower curtain–and they want to take it away? If they screw with my Social Security, I’ll have to tie wheels and a rifle to my walker and make my objections known.
i’m not so sure about that .. there’s a coule of theories that affect the definition .. one is that the left right continuim is actually a circle and one can go only so far to the right before they end up back on the extreme left ..[or vice versa] the authoritorian left .. and the authoritorian right both resemble each other in terms of the structure being police states .. and the second is the fact .. that if you examine the liber-terror-ans disdain for almost any laws .. the actual system they propose would result in a state of near anarchy ..
The Repubs are saying some amazing things these days. Heh.
Which would be more efficient for driving that metal around, gasoline from oil or electricity from nuclear or coal burning?
How is using a battery a massive increase?
Isn’t any use of batteries going to be more efficient than internal combustion engines?
First, he was committing fraud by not paying them from investment gains.
Second, he’s not the government and couldn’t really guarantee their payments.
Trying to inspire confidence in the fiscal responsibility the Obama administration feels and tries to exhibit during this crisis.
Sometimes it’s not enough to fix a problem.
Sometimes you have to be seen fixing a problem…even if it’s not a problem.
It’s not enough to walk a tight rope.
You must make it look difficult, so the audience will KNOW it’s difficult.
There are survivor benefits, but you’re right that it isn’t identical to bonds.
Now there’s a statement you don’t hear every day! Good one!