How is that my problem? It's the government that structured the fund in such a way that would make it illegal in the private sector. If the money I paid in is gone/already paid out and it is indeed a retirement savings program as alleged, that strikes me as a massive fraud foisted on the American people and I see no value in perpetuating it.
D.C. Circuit guts ObamaCare
- Thread starter DinoDoc
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You are a couple of years behind the times. The US is no longer AAA.
Farm Boy
I hope you dance
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Well, then strip off the fraud with understanding to clear up that part then decide if the changes that SS has had on our society have any value in them?
I mean, if you really want to get down to the sticking point of government run ponzi scheme compare say the Federal government's ponzi/retirement program for the public with the State of Illinois' retirement scheme for it's employees. Given that both entities select the members that implement these plans through the same system, I wouldn't have any additional faith in members of Federal Congress to "make things work out" like they do in the private sector(or Illinois). A sector which has the option to do things like fire people days before vesting cliffs, and which it does aggressively.
I mean, if you really want to get down to the sticking point of government run ponzi scheme compare say the Federal government's ponzi/retirement program for the public with the State of Illinois' retirement scheme for it's employees. Given that both entities select the members that implement these plans through the same system, I wouldn't have any additional faith in members of Federal Congress to "make things work out" like they do in the private sector(or Illinois). A sector which has the option to do things like fire people days before vesting cliffs, and which it does aggressively.
You're a voter trying to change the system.
It's not a massive fraud. You're going to get your SS cheque. And, SS will continue to perform its liquidity and welfare functions.
You might see no value in perpetuating it, but refuse to name the group who gets screwed in order to end it.
I'll not deny it was insidious. There's a momentum problem here. Right now, no one's going to get screwed (except in principle). A proportion of those principled people want someone to get screwed, but only a teeny subset of them think that they should be the one biting the bullet. You can see why it has momentum.
I'll not deny it needs tweaking. Honestly, the tweaks to keep it sustainable are really both gentle and kinda reasonable.
Ah, so just the people older than you who paid in their entire working lives, eh? Well, good luck with that. That's the "keep your government hands out of my Medicare" cohort.
In all honesty, I think they hold the largest moral culpability. That cohort had something like 40 years to elect the gov't that would end the cycle. They're the ones who voted for Reagan or Carter and then passed the buck. They veritably foisted the obligation. They'll whine, they think it's the rookie's turn to spend time in the barrel, just like they did.
The hilarious part is that they lived during the SS surplus years, and borrowed from the fund to spend on themselves. So, yeah, it's that cohort. The having cake and eating it too cohort. It's politically tough, like I said, they're the "keep your government hands out of my Medicare" cohort. They'll whine. And they vote.
Ah, so just the people older than you who paid in their entire working lives, eh? Well, good luck with that. That's the "keep your government hands out of my Medicare" cohort.
In all honesty, I think they hold the largest moral culpability. That cohort had something like 40 years to elect the gov't that would end the cycle. They're the ones who voted for Reagan or Carter and then passed the buck. They veritably foisted the obligation. They'll whine, they think it's the rookie's turn to spend time in the barrel, just like they did.
The hilarious part is that they lived during the SS surplus years, and borrowed from the fund to spend on themselves. So, yeah, it's that cohort. The having cake and eating it too cohort. It's politically tough, like I said, they're the "keep your government hands out of my Medicare" cohort. They'll whine. And they vote.
Farm Boy
I hope you dance
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Then there is the Hygro-esque argument that not spending the surplus would have been dangerous. Right? Am I so twisting his argument that it wouldn't actually have an issue with a program so expensive as SS/Medicare taxing currency out of the system and not putting it all back? Sort of like how educational loans running a massive profit do?
Yes. Not so much dangerous as obviously deflationary. DinoDoc's plan is the same thing. Now, I'm less anti-deflationary than the average bear, but I do acknowledge that slightly inflationary policies are obviously superior - they lead to faster growth and to higher employment levels. It's both easier to tap idle productivity and to make profitable investments.
The awfulness of that spending is entirely determined by what it was spent on. It's like any investment, they can be purchased in ways that lead to supply side growth, or not spent in such ways.
100% of the employment benefit of that spending was captured by Baby Boomers and older (let's remember the multiplier effect, too). The liquidity benefit helped them out, too.
Now, a strong argument could be made that my generation is better off than the counterfactual - despite that I owe money on purchases I never consented to. That would be a really difficult argument to prove, but the back-of-the-envelope is pretty easy. I mean, I don't live in a Red Dawn work camp (thanks Reagan!) and I'm posting on the internet (thanks Gore!) and I can afford gas for my car (thanks Bush!), but yes, it's entirely possible for that surplus to not have been spent in ways that benefited future generations ... it's kinda unlikely, but it's possible.
The awfulness of that spending is entirely determined by what it was spent on. It's like any investment, they can be purchased in ways that lead to supply side growth, or not spent in such ways.
100% of the employment benefit of that spending was captured by Baby Boomers and older (let's remember the multiplier effect, too). The liquidity benefit helped them out, too.
Now, a strong argument could be made that my generation is better off than the counterfactual - despite that I owe money on purchases I never consented to. That would be a really difficult argument to prove, but the back-of-the-envelope is pretty easy. I mean, I don't live in a Red Dawn work camp (thanks Reagan!) and I'm posting on the internet (thanks Gore!) and I can afford gas for my car (thanks Bush!), but yes, it's entirely possible for that surplus to not have been spent in ways that benefited future generations ... it's kinda unlikely, but it's possible.
Actually, certain ratings agencies are behind the times as U.S. Treasuries have outperformed other sovereign debt rated AAA.
Timsup2nothin
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Well, that's easy enough. Quit working. As a side benefit, you're off the hook for income taxes too.
Supreme Court heard this issue today. Looks like it will end up 6 to 3 in favor of Obamacare.
onejayhawk
Afflicted with reason
Given comments by Alito and Scalia, they postpone implementation for Congress to fix it or the States to form exchanges.
Timsup2nothin
Deity
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System we had is gone. Implementation of new system blocked by Republicans. No health care system at all. Thanks GOP, good planing on your part. Who votes for these geniuses?
Fortunately I think the supreme court will save them, and us, from their glaring stupidity.
Fortunately I think the supreme court will save them, and us, from their glaring stupidity.
kramerfan86
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If the supreme court does not reverse the circuit's decision I will be enraged because that will mean this court agreed the law was legal in that you HAD to buy insurance... but then it promptly turned around and gutted the part of the law that actually made that affordable for some people.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2015/03/04/supreme-court-obama-health-care/24320547/
This whole thing is making me slightly embarrassed to be American.
This whole thing is making me slightly embarrassed to be American.
sophie
Break My Heart
Agreed. Let's just vote in single payer already.
No need to feel embarrassment about the Notorious RBG.
FriendlyFire
Codex WMDicanious
Just remember that "Unions" and "Welfare" are in the constitution. While airforce is not.
That traitor Woodrow and hes unconstitutional air force.
hobbsyoyo
Deity
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Let's be honest though, you don't want to pay into it regardless because taxes.
Well this is half a lie. Though it's currently projected to go into the red sometime in the future (a date that is always going to shift and is hard to pin down due to changing economic/political circumstances) it will not just stop paying out altogether. I read yesterday that even if things continued on exactly as they are today into the future, the fund will be paying something like 75% of it's obligated payments well into this century. It's not like the fund will hit a point where it goes bankrupt and no one will get SS checks - you will still get them even in a worse case scenario but they won't be quite as large as they would have been.
And assuming we'll continue on the exact same fiscal path for SS for decades is a long shot by any measure.
But hey, let's all continue on pretending SS is a ponzi scheme that's *this* close to total insolvency because that's the only way people of certain mindset will ever see it.
