The Future of Social Security in Challenging Times
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-09-12/future-social-security-challenging-times
One in seven Americans receives a Social Security benefit. More than ninety percent of all workers are in jobs covered by Social Security. But concerns are growing over the long-term viability of the program. Texas Governor and presidential front-runner Rick Perry says Social Security is "a Ponzi scheme" and "monstrous lie." the congressional debt supercommittee is expected to consider Social Security revisions. And advocates worry the payroll tax cut extension proposed by President Obama could shrink revenues. A panel joins Diane to discuss options for the future of Social Security.
Guests
Mark Miller
syndicated columnist and author of "The Hard Times Guide to Retirement Security"
Nancy Altman
co-director of Social Security Works, co-chair of the Strenghen Social Security coalition and campaign and author of "The Battle for Social Security."
Charles Blahous
a Hoover research fellow, one of two public trustees for the Social Security and Medicare Programs and author of "Social Security: The Unfinished Work."
Related Items
Program Highlights
Changes to the social security system will be on the congressional debt super committee's agenda. President Obama hopes to ignite to job market in part by extending cuts to payroll taxes that otherwise would go into the trust fund. Diane and guests looked at the history of the system, changes legislators have made to it, and how it compares to retirement plans.
Can Social Security Legitimately be Called a Ponzi Scheme?
Mark Miller said that Gov. Perry's comment was reckless and irresponsible. "The essence of Social Security is that people pay taxes and they accumulate credits, and in return, they get a pension. And that's a program that's been working for 75 years. And the essence of a Ponzi scheme, if you checked that in a dictionary, is criminal fraud," Miller said.
How Social Security Compares to Insurance and Pension Plans
"Social Security is an extremely good deal...some people talked about the need to modernize Social Security, but the concept is really thoroughly modern. The idea is that as long as workers are dependent and their families are dependent on wage income, they need insurance against the loss of those wages. They need unemployment insurance if they lose their jobs, disability insurance if they become disabled, life insurance, old-age insurance. Social Security provides the last three," said Nancy Altman.
Who Bears the Risk?
Altman:"A fundamental difference is, with individual accounts, the risk is all borne by the individual. If the stock market is down or your investments are down, you're in trouble if you have to retire. With Social Security and, generally, with defined-benefit plans, the risk is shared by everyone. With Social Security, it's shared by the entire nation. That’s what makes it work so well. "
Lifting the Income Cap
Blahous:"The more you pay into the system, the more you get out. It's not designed to be a welfare program. Basically, no matter how rich you are, no matter how poor you are, you get something back for your contributions. So if you lift the cap, then unless you sever that link between contributions and benefits, then you're gonna obligate a very large amount of additional benefit outlays to people who need them least. You're basically bringing in more revenue from rich people to pay more benefits to rich people."
Our Guests Suggest Fixes to the System
Miller:"I would do it by lifting and eliminating the cap on income subject to tax."
Blahous:"I would make progressive changes to restrain the growth of benefits, still above inflation, but restrain the growth to people on the higher income end. And I would, unlike my colleagues, raise the retirement age at least to get it back to where we were when the program first began."
Altman:"Some have talked about dedicating a tax on stocks speculation, a kind of tax that Great Britain has. Dedicate that to Social Security, you actually could raise the benefits. That's how much money is brought in. There are other kinds. Some have talked about dedicating the estate tax."
Comments
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KadeKo wrote:
"As an independent voter I'm tired of the rhetoric on both sides of the aisle."
Perry says "Ponzi scheme". After his "mandate" win, GWB wanted to privatize a chunk of Soc Sec--got his bottom sawed off for that, even before the last ~4 years of the roller-coaster stock market"
Kadeko:
And a buddle would have been made for SS if put in the private market. The low in the market was reached at 6000 in Feb 2009. Even today after last weeks sell off it is close to 11,000.
If SS was allowed to invest in private market, we may have more businesses which means more jobs. Tax and spend like drunken sailors has not done anything to the economy.
Diane
One of your callers questioned the Government loans from the Social Security trust fund equalling $14T. One of your guests noted that the debt was (I believe) actually $2.3T, " included in the Federal debt". I am concerned about the misunderstanding on this point.
John Walker(the former US Comptroller General) notes in his 2009 book "Come Back America" that in fact the US Government loans from the trust funds are NOT considered liabilities on the Government books, and therefore are not included in the overall debt. At this point I believe Mr Walker (now CEO of the Peterson Institute). Could someone clarify this point for me...or is Mr Walker not correct? It's a significant point as the actual federal debt is much higher than is "advertised", if Mr. walker is correct.
Social Security is NOT a ponzi scheme. It's very sad we're giving Governor Perry so much air time over this bold faced lie. Let's stop dignifying falsehoods. It does the American public a great disservice.
Social Security has $2.6 trillion surplus and can pay full benefits until 2036. At that time, only 78% of benefits will be paid, but we can all agree this modest shortfall can and should be addressed without a massive cut in benefits or dismantling the program entirely. The Cato Institute has been using this "ponzi scheme" propaganda for more than 30 years to discourage young people from thinking they will see a Social Security check, therefore trying to weaken support for the program. They called it a "Leninist Strategy." http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/02/15/945309/-Social-Security-Reform:...
I am very pleased Diane Rehm interviewed Nancy Altman and Mark Miller for this piece. It's about time people heard the truth about Social Security: http://www.ncpssm.org/truth_squad/index.php
1.) Social Security is based on taxes on wages. There is much higher productivity than when it was introduced, but this has not been reflected in our wages, and so the scheme is underfunded. Why, it were almost as if the gains were mostly siphoned off somewhere else, in the form of other gains not so taxed.
2.) Social Security was introduced both to relieve crushing poverty among the elderly and to make it easier for older workers to leave the work-force.
3.) I have already gained from Social Security though it is decades off, in the money I haven't had to send to my parents and in the money they felt they were able to spend on (e.g.) my education because they had some sort of floor below which they could not fall.
4.) I have gained from Social Security in some of the personally and economically rewarding career risks it has helped me to take.
Jackie Saunders wrote:
"Social Security has $2.6 trillion surplus and can pay full benefits until 2036"
False. SS has $2.6 trillion in T-bills. The actual money is gone; borrowed against by General Fund spending. That's a fact. "You could look it up".
The ... money ... is ... gone.
T-bills are not cash. They are promises to pay. Nothing more They are not an asset. They are a debt liability.
The SS "trust fund" will be upside-down in about 5 or 6 years - i.e. current contributors will not be able to fund current retirees. In 15 to 20 years baby boomer retirement is in full blossom. Where do you think the money is going to come from to pay them?
"Social Security is NOT a ponzi scheme. "
Yeah. It is.
Ponzi scheme: "an investment swindle in which some early investors are paid off with money put up by later ones in order to encourage more and bigger risks "
That's the very definition of how social security works. Previous "investors" require new investors to keep the cycle going. As you get more and more investors being paid off, you need more and more new investors to keep the scheme going. That's exactly what is happening to Social Security today.
The only way to mitigate its eventual failure is to get oldsters dropping off the back end (i.e. dying). When SS was instituted HALF of contributers would NEVER COLLECT A DIME because they would be dead at 65. The retirement age HAD TO be indexed to longevity and it wasn't. If it had been, the retirement age now would be 72 to 75 and more people would be taking steps to protect themselves in old age.
What you have as a result is ... you guessed it ... a Ponzi scheme.
"If SS was allowed to invest in private market, we may have more businesses which means more jobs."
And the government would be picking winners and losers. Actually, let's back up: Prove that the whole idea is anything but some right-wing think tank's wet dream of having a few % off the SocSec trust funds scraped off and put in their pocket.
And the last thing we need now is investment funds. Corporations are sitting on 100s of billions which aren't worth investing because, more or less, all the good investments have been subscribed to that there's no point in buying them at their cost.
The problem now is lack of demand.
"Tax and spend like drunken sailors has not done anything to the economy."
Borrow and spend has done less. I'd take that more seriously if, under 8 years of GWB and 5 years of an "economic expansion", the GOP submitted and/or passed a balanced budget. If you are that concerned, your quibble is with your own.
You are invited to look up 1937.
KadeKo wrote:
"Prove that the whole idea is anything but some right-wing think tank's wet dream of having a few % off the SocSec trust funds scraped off and put in their pocket."
OK. When you prove that the whole idea of "investing" SS funds in T-bills is anything but some left-wing think tank's wet dream of how to get their hands on billions of SS contributions to spend.
"And the government would be picking winners and losers. Actually, let's back up: Prove that the whole idea is anything but some right-wing think tank's wet dream of having a few % off the SocSec trust funds scraped off and put in their pocket"
Government choices are losers. Put it up to bid with private money managers. The market went up to 14,000 in July 2007. Takes some off put and create a Trust for SS. Look how the left has managed tax payer contibutions. Borrowing in 1966 from SS to pay for Vietman and Great Society(A Failure). By definition there is no TRUST.
"And the last thing we need now is investment funds. Corporations are sitting on 100s of billions which aren't worth investing because, more or less, all the good investments have been subscribed to that there's no point in buying them at their cost"
Very wise decision. Corporation do not know how much they will have to pay on a 14 trillion dollar debt. Tax Bill not known. Health Care Act, nobody knows how much corporations will pay. Pass then write it as Polosi said.
"Borrow and spend has done less." Maybe I should say make money out of paper and find someway how to spend it. Na I would take Bush years over this inexperence lefty that has left made this country in 3yrs worse than Bushes.
"1937" That is when FDR Secretary of Treasurey said "All this spending and nothing has happened"
Keep drinking your koolaid.
Mark Miller's explanations why social security is not a Ponzi scheme were very weak, because S.S. is not against the law was his strongest argument! The panel was loaded top to bottom with government apologists so it should be of no surprise to anyone at the apparent consensus. Further all seemed quite comfortable with the "democrat" party tax the rich mantra as well. hmm wonder who they will vote for in 2012, Ron Paul!
I still think my first two posts were bullet proof evidence that S.S. is a Ponzi scheme, it can be ignored but not dismissed.
"Government choices are losers."
Except when government choices are so often things that you can't make money off of, but everyone needs to make money.
I hope your jetpack and urine-to-potable-water machine work better than anything I've ever heard of. I'll be busy looking at the charts showing how our infrastructure has gone from first- to third-world in a decade and change.
Yes, 1937. Corporations need demand. They are squeezing extra "productivity" out of every possible employee right now.
I'd point out how many respected, no axe to grind economists are talking about 1937 redux, but there's no telling some people. Tens of millions of Americans get to drop out, unretire, and pillage their retirement funds while we wait for the corporate enables who got us into this craphole to rescue us.
You really don't know the state of the economy in late 2008. Drink up yourself, bub.
@meanconser:
"I would probably have more in retirement if I could be given the opportunity to put my money in private investments instead of SS."
Really? You either had uncanny vision that allowed you to dodge the stock market collapse in 2008, you are doing insider trading, or you just don't take into consideration context, facts, and history when making such outrageous statements like this.
Most Americans have lost 40-50% of their 401k and retirement investments and have not recovered. Investing in the stock market as a retirement strategy relies heavily on timing, namely that your retirement will be timed with an upswing and not a downswing. Moreover, most people who pay into SS don't have the savvy to invest, or significant funds to invest.
Sam in Texas wrote:
"Most Americans have lost 40-50% of their 401k and retirement investments and have not recovered. Investing in the stock market as a retirement strategy relies heavily on timing, namely that your retirement will be timed with an upswing and not a downswing. Moreover, most people who pay into SS don't have the savvy to invest, or significant funds to invest."
This is the specious argument of the left with respect to privatization - or even partial privatization.
I don't know if your stat is true or not wrt 40-50% of 401k money lost and people not being able to recover in time for retirement. If that is true, then they were invested more agressively than they should have been for their age. If people do that it is because they are greedy.
But that's 401K money. Let's talk SS. The key point of the Bush plan for partial privatization is that it would be a graduated level of investment decreasing with nearness to retirement. 30 year olds would have more invested, 40 year olds would have less invested and 50 year olds would have next to nothing invested in stocks. The criticism of the left (with Teddy Kennedy at the bow) was not based in altruism, but in a desire to hold onto the SS slush fund and in demagoguing fear-tactics that Republicans wanted to gamble with peoples' retirement. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
Finally, even those funds that were invested in stocks wouldn't need "savvy" because investment choices and amounts would be limited by law; you might be able to invest in SPY or QQQQ, but not in GOOG or MSFT directly.
Never kid a kidder, Sam. Keeping the status quo in SS has never been about doing what is best for the American people. It's been about keeping Congress's grubby fingers on the forced contributions of the nation's workers. Nothing more.
If you're a fascist brainwasheee of CATO or Rick Perry who believes Social Security is a Ponzi Scheme and that the premiums you pay are simply taxes, then do I have a killer solution for you. When you're eligible don't file and don't collect. The rest of us won't miss you at all. Besides, if you're such a smart investor as you claim and such a big-prostated manly success (taken from Jon Stewart's Daily Show) , you won't need "welfare" anyway. You don't have to eat the whole smorgasbord Big Shots, you could leave some for the majority who can barely pay the cover. (Why would the smartest men in the world who have made every correct choice and have the world on a string be writing in here to demolish a maintenance program for the poorest poor of the elderly and disabled?)
SS, SSdi, and military health care are three universal American success stories.
Why non-military denied health care across land, or have access until funds exhausted, is a national disgrace. And HUGE expense.
298 million Americans(2 million active duty) ALL contributing to a universal health and security system reduces cost and complications for all.
Unfortunately the MONEY is behind for profit health 'care' as opposed to a 'for human' health care system. Bankers want those retirement dollars.
The biggest contributor to present and future costs is
the for global profit(not American patient) system of health care.
Unfortunately barraged by monied ads Americans afraid of losing what little they have in hopes of becoming the monied class.
Easy to divide Americans,into two groups- those that experience American health care- 24 hour waits at ER's or NONE AND those bankrupted by illness- OR those healthy with dead relatives or having Congressional type coverages.
DO NOT CARE which parties or candidates enable equal and honest health care/ security for ALL Americans. He/she HAS our votes.
Just think if after 9-11 our treasury had been spent on REAL American's security and health improvements AND what a showcase to foil anti-American sentiments and terrorism.
But many lawyers would be unemployed and that would be anti-Congress(progress?).
Fear wins over reason. Silly huMANs.
Sam in Texas wrote:
"Really? You either had uncanny vision that allowed you to dodge the stock market collapse in 2008, you are doing insider trading, or you just don't take into consideration context, facts, and history when making such outrageous statements like this"
Sam:
Neither one. I told in last weeks thread that I lost big times in BAC. I am small potatoes in my stock investments
"Sam continues
Most Americans have lost 40-50% of their 401k and retirement investments and have not recovered. Investing in the stock market as a retirement strategy relies heavily on timing, namely that your retirement will be timed with an upswing and not a downswing. Moreover, most people who pay into SS don't have the savvy to invest, or significant funds to invest"
I was one of those, but I didn't panick Sam. Guess what, I rode it out and just about recovered when the market hit 12000 in August. No timing just realizing about good quality companies and believing in diversification. Don't need to be savvy to invest. Put it in a mutual fund. Unfornantely there are many people who work but don't care to put a few dollars a paycheck in their 401k that their company's can match as high as $0.75 to the $1.00. Now just think if those people you mentioned could put that SS in a 401k money market account, they would still be in better shape than the 3% SS makes.
As usual the argument is framed as to whether Social Security is viable or not. And Perry, et al, make their claims and the other side jumps to the defense of SocSec. Of course, SocSec is not a Ponzi scheme, but the allegation that it is, itself is a con job intended to make it easier to steal one of the largest sums of money ever collected on earth.
As part of a successful effort to steal the funds, these robbers divert attention from their real plans and help to weaken the protections against their theft. By claiming that the sums are not well protected or are disappearing, it is more likely for the potential recipients to not protest as much as the robbers propose redistributing the booty. And since creating doubt is the purpose, just defending Soc Sec against spurious charges allows the attackers crafty diversion of attention.
It is not accidental that these grifters do not talk about increasing the contributions to Social Security to protect it (like raising the income limit). It is always about limiting the benefits to old people (they seem not to care if the elderly starve or lose housing while the thieves dine in mansions). Or to shift the money into the stock market where the wolves have practiced with 401Ks and private pensions how to carve up their victims.
Please stop responding to these vampires as if they were honestly concerned with the welfare of the public and vulnerable elderly and were making an honest argument. By allowing this simple back and forth argument, you may seem like you are helping, but notice that the argument itself is harming the protections and creating doubt.
To protect Social Security, you must do the detective work to look through their claims, and when they don't make sense, don't assume that they are stupid. They are crazy like a fox (and you are handing them the hen house). Instead call them out for their motives, a heist to steal our future and leave our seniors penniless.
Daniel
Daniel,
I'm so glad you're back on this subject. The thing I like about our little repartes is that you don't have to resort to viscious ad hominem attacks like some posters; you know, the ones who refer to those who disagree with them as cons, grifters, thieves, wolves, vampires. Don't you just HATE that?!
So, let's get to it, shall we. I think I can summarize your post as follows; here we have a failing system (by your own words, it needs to be "protected") and your solution is to prop it up by taking citizens' legally gotten money and giving it to whomever you choose. Does that sound about right?
Then you further demagogue the issue by saying things like " It is always about limiting the benefits to old people ". Well, Daniel, it's really not about that at all, and I think you know it. No one I have heard is talking about taking ANYTHING from current or near-retirees - looking out usually 10 to 15 years or so.
What it's about is making the system solvent for the next 100 years without resorting to tactics that ... well ... fascist countries use.
So, let's start off by at least showing a little honesty, shall we?
You are misrepresenting what I said or you misunderstand.
The only protection Social Security needs is from those who want to drain it of cash and are using scare tactics to try and fool folks into allowing the theft.
One of the tactics is to claim that any changes will not effect those in or about to be in the system. This is a very crafty tactic to distract those who would complain about the theft immediately to instead sit out while the theft takes place. At no point will anyone, old or young, go without their Social Security pension as long as the system isn't dismantled.
Let me be clear, Social Security is only at risk by those who are lying about it by calling it a Ponzi scheme and create doubt. Rather than continuing waste time arguing with arguing against the lies, people should call out the potential theft.
Daniel
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/09/09/is-social-security-a-pon...
citizencontact wrote:
"The only protection Social Security needs is from those who want to drain it of cash and are using scare tactics to try and fool folks into allowing the theft. "
That would be the Democrats. They started draining the fund of cash in the late 60's in the Johnson administration, spending the money, and have been in charge of that draining for most of the succeeding decades. So on that point we are completely agreed.
Thanks for posting the link as well. This part particularly struck me
"Social Security will last indefinitely, with occasional adjustments like the bipartisan reforms enacted in 1983, .... Social Security cannot “go bankrupt.” If it were to run short of funds, benefits would be reduced or taxes raised. Even if it is not balanced in that way, it will not be broke: three-quarters of benefits would continue to be paid."
What the writer finally admits is that we are closing in on the latter phase of the Ponzi scheme. Now, I will grant you the term "Ponzi scheme" is charged, and perhaps a bit of hyperbole, but it is essentially how SS works. The Merriam Webster definition is "an investment swindle in which some early investors are paid off with money put up by later ones in order to encourage more and bigger risks " and your writer essentially admits that. Now, this particular scheme may not collapse suddenly as most Ponzi schemes do, but it will result in individuals getting less and in some cases far less than they were originally promised.
We are not agreed on any point. No one has been "draining" the Social Security fund. This is another tactic to confuse people. Social Security is robust.
Paul Pierson wrote facts, he did not admit things. He wrote that Social Security is strong.
Unless people stand up to this dishonest attack on Social Security to pave the way to stealing trillions of dollars, we risk losing it.
Daniel
citizencontact wrote:
"We are not agreed on any point. No one has been "draining" the Social Security fund. "
Of COURSE they have! Otherwise, there would not be a single T-Bill in the Trust Fund. The ... cash ... is ... gone. All that is left is a promise to pay.
Trillions of dollars. More secure than Fort Knox. And there are thieves with designs on this tremendous sum of money that the elderly depend on. They will say anything to get access to our money, they will try and confuse us, lie about it being gone already, say we can't depend on it. Not just lies, but the tactic of crooks and thieves.
We must stand up to this sustained assault by these grifters, con men who won't stop trying to skim and steal our wealth.
Daniel
"They will say anything "
You said a mouthful, there cc.
They will accuse Paul Ryan of throwing granny off a cliff. They will lie about what the "Trust Fund" represents. They will demagogue and scare. All to keep people from taking their spending slush fund and putting it in PERSONALly trackable SAFE investments that the Federal Government cannot touch.
THAT is what a grifter does - he looks you in the eye, says he's your friend while he picks your pocket. The Democrats have been doing it since the 60's.
We will accuse Paul Ryan of threatening Social Security when he threatens our Social Security. It is important to understand the goals of those like Ryan who want dismantle our Social Security. They want to loot the largest sum of money ever accumulated-they expect a huge payoff if they can frighten us into destroying the system that has kept millions alive and out of poverty and will continue to keep millions alive and out of poverty.
They will repeat lies about how the Federal Government is untrustworthy, when we know that is a huge lie, as it is a democratic institution that we depend on to fight on our behalf and for whom many of us continue to protect with our lives.
We must ignore these scare tactics that somehow we won't pay ourselves our own pensions. They will make up stories of "safe" investments, safer than our own government who has the prime law enforcement departments and courts that actually protect us from these thieves (how can they be so anti-American government...because they want to kill our golden goose for their personal gain).
Daniel
"We will accuse Paul Ryan of threatening Social Security when he threatens our Social Security. It is important to understand the goals of those like Ryan who want dismantle our Social Security. They want to loot the largest sum of money ever accumulated-they expect a huge payoff "
cc, you seem like a nice guy most of the time. I really mean that, and I think your motives are pure. But those are just words. How is Paul Ryan going to benefit if his plan were to go into affect? Let's just start there.
"We must ignore these scare tactics that somehow we won't pay ourselves our own pensions. "
That is equivalent to putting your head in the sand and hoping there will be money there for you at 65 or 67 or whatever. Why would you not want to pay into an account that is yours to fund your OWN retirement, rather than someone else's? That's all this is about.
"they want to kill our golden goose for their personal gain"
Again, this is little more than some sort of left talking point. I don't even know what it means. Explain to me how you think Republicans are trying to "kill your golden goose for their personal gain".
I would hope that trying to keep seniors from having their pensions stolen would be a good thing.
Right now there are trillions of dollars that are guaranteed better than any bank or investment firm could guarantee any account. Unfortunately, some want to pocket that money rather than it be disbursed as promised.
Thieves have devised a plan that involves first weakening the defenses against such a plunder. Like the best grifters, they confuse their victims, the American public into thinking that the money is gone and that we need to open the bank and divvy up what's left. Once the vaults are opened, our future will be looted. It doesn't matter to you or me what scheme the thieves have for our money, the result is that the elderly will no longer have an absolute societal protection against abandonment and being left to die. We as a people have the capacity to ensure that we do not need to let each other die or suffer needlessly.
The reality is that anyone can put aside additional wealth into a myriad of private investments today in addition to our promised pension that is Social Security. But we must not allow crooks to scam us out of our right to a decent old age.
Daniel
"Thieves have devised a plan that involves first weakening the defenses against such a plunder. "
OK, what is that plan? It doesn't sound like you know. Because you then say, "It doesn't matter to you or me what scheme the thieves have for our money." So is this some kind of paranoid delusion because someone has dared touch the third rail? I don't mean that as a dig, cc.
"The reality is that anyone can put aside additional wealth...."
And they should be doing it. That way, SS could be what it was intended to be - a safety net, rather than a retirement plan.
(cont).
I have the inkling from this post that you think one day the trust fund will be there and the next day it will be emptied and split among SS participants and some grifter will come along and steal it. That's just not correct. The government will still hold the money. The concept of private accounts in SS are not 401Ks. The difference is, it will be money for your retirement that the government cannot borrow against and cannot spend, that can be invested in safe investments (if you are a long term investor - say in your 30's) like T-Bills, U.S. Stocks, International stocks, perhaps some gold, that taken together, over a life-time will out-perform T-bills alone. As time goes on, your holdings will be adjusted to more and more safety, until, sometime in your 50's you're back in something like T-bills again - but you've got a lot more money to supplement your retirement than you would have had in T-bills alone for a lifetime.
That's the basic concept of private accounts. They are not 401Ks held by a bank or investment house and the investment choices would be extremely limited.
This is not "crooks scamming us out of our right to a decent old age". It's a plan to ensure that today's young workers will have a decent income in their old age to retire on.
It's also a way to limit the FG's ability to spend away our futures. Cutting off that revenue stream, I think, is the biggest objection of most big government progressives - whether they realize it or not.
Wow. You sound like an dupe of the crooks who have bamboozled many in the public into thinking that dismantling Social Security will make more money for you. If people want more money than Social Security guaranteed pension give, they should invest in any way they want in addition to receiving their Social Security checks. Unfortunately, many private pensions are no longer defined benefit and are often underfunded and at risk. And past returns in private investments are no guarantee of future ones.
I guess that the reason the crooks want to dismantle Social Security is to get access to the trillions of dollars that would be funneled into private markets (and without the rights of voting stock like normal shareholders). The Social Security system is a tremendous target for thieves and scallywags, and only by taking away the guarantee can they get access to the money. And without guaranteed benefits, our life savings looted, we would be impoverished in our old age -- ha, ha our own fault as we let them dismantle Social Security and replace it with something not guaranteed.
If the government ever needs more to cover Social Security benefits, we can just allow the FICA tax to cover amounts over the current limit of the first $106,000 in income. Or we could do what the thieves prefer, borrow that same amount from them and/or decrease benefits for the elderly.
Daniel
Ugh. I have no more to say. You seem unable to grasp the fact that the FG would STILL CONTROL THE CONTRIBUTIONS. It wouldn't be out there for the "thieves and scallywags". The major difference would be that Congress could no longer borrow against it. In fact, THAT's what you object to. Democrats (and some Republicans) would no longer be able to buy votes with borrowed money. This is the reason that liberals fight this so ferociously. It's like trying to take the drugs from an addict.