Social Security

[ColonelTroll]

I had a discussion the other night about Social Security. I stated that I would vote for someone that would cut payouts enough to balance the checkbook. An older (retired) friend nodded, but added that retirees should be grandfathered in. I said 'No, they should not be grandfathered in because they failed to fix it in their day."

Comments?

[blueback]

Good luck enforcing personal responsibility. No one wants to punish the lack of it because they would be punishing themselves.

[MichaelH]

Social security is, in practice, a version of the Ponzi scheme (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), but intended to provide benefits rather than defraud investors. The current taxpayers pay for the current retirees' benefits.

The fundamental problem is this: for basically anyone still living, the government has taken 15%-23% of their life's income to fund social security. This comes out before deductions; if you earn money, social security gets a cut. That is money the person has not had available to fund their own retirement. 20% lifetime savings would result in a great private retirement! Stopping social security requires that some generation of workers foot the bill for others to retire, then try to fund their own retirement privately also. (That's exactly what's being suggested to generation X, who's not about to stand for it. Neither will generation Y, in their turn.) Any attempt to stop or reduce future social security deprives people the benefit of money the government took at gunpoint with promises to repay in the future.

In my opinion, social security won't go away until there are more young voters than old voters. That won't happen at least until the baby boomers die off. Somebody is going to get screwed at some point. It's just a question of who and when.

[Dave C C]

It should be ended, unfortunately our democracy allows a large baby boomer population to enforce their will untill generation y can out vote them. Good old generation X will get the pleasure of being screwed again.

[blueback]

When all the baby boomers die will the economy suffer? Since most of them are retired aren't they consuming instead of producing? If they are die, and are no longer consuming, won't there be less demand?

[redbaren]

When all the baby boomers die will the economy suffer? Since most of them are retired aren't they consuming instead of producing? If they are die, and are no longer consuming, won't there be less demand?
If you think about it, I think the population would be more level, when the baby boomers are gone. Since the boomers raised the population unnaturally, by that I am saying the population was not supposed to increase at that rate. The population will become more level to our food supply's and economical needs.

[notoppings]

Where does my generation fit in I'm not a boomer or an X I was born in the 60's a child of the love/hippie generation.

Most of our parents who were hippies or returning from Vietnam taught our generation a big distrust for the government. We were taught to expect nothing from the government, prepare your own future. So I vote for no more social security, I can handle my own investments and secure a future for myself.

Take whats there and invest it wisely and distribute it till the pensioners die off.


That will never happen because to many people only wade through life instead of swimming their own course, so we would still end up with a large portion of the population that is unprepared for their own retirement. Then where would we be, no SSI, but larger, older groups on welfare.

[Serpent7]

I had a discussion the other night about Social Security. I stated that I would vote for someone that would cut payouts enough to balance the checkbook. An older (retired) friend nodded, but added that retirees should be grandfathered in. I said 'No, they should not be grandfathered in because they failed to fix it in their day."
Comments?I agree with you in THEORY. I think it would be extremely satisfying -on an emotional level- to hand a screw-job to the BBs. However, it would not be productive. Even assuming we could get it passed, it would create HUGE problems to dramatically decrease the income level of such a large segment of the population.
No, something else will have to be done. How about making it income-dependent, rather than contribution dependent?

[zibber]

I had a discussion the other night about Social Security. I stated that I would vote for someone that would cut payouts enough to balance the checkbook. An older (retired) friend nodded, but added that retirees should be grandfathered in. I said 'No, they should not be grandfathered in because they failed to fix it in their day."

Out of curiosity- which checkbook?

If you mean the (US) national budget, I'd disagree. There's plenty of other things that can be cut without hurting people like that financially, if your goal is to reduce the deficit. Obviously this is quite subjective, but cuts on military spending and a crackdown on the wealthy avoiding taxes by funneling money to offshore accounts would be a pretty swell start.

[Monte314]

I've been paying into social security for over thirty years... for that last 10 or so, I've been paying the MAXIMUM. So has my wife. What should my view on this question be?

Of course, I believe ultimately that ColonelTroll is right about generations "fixing" social security "in their day". Therefore I recommend, for the benefit of his children, that social security be "fixed" when he reaches his 65th birthday.

[ColonelTroll]

All, thanks for the comments.

I believe it unlikely there will be any substantial change in policy and practice by the govt and the account balance will go negative in 2012/2017 (numbers vary based on source) - we will borrow money to pay benefits, leaving the interest to be paid by "not us."

With no change in policy, I will continue to pay $X,000 per year so that my money may make someone else's poor choices more comfortable.

You pay 6.2%, on gross wages up to $102,000, plus 1.45% for Medicare, and your employer pays the same 7.65% (would be a nice raise if you could stop paying it and invest it yourself!).

I find it offensive that a Federal Govt has to provide financial security for individuals with no option out. As if the govt can be smarter than I am in the handling of my personal finances... Do you believe the govt will do better than you can in making your personal financial solutions?

Is there a candidate that calls for reducing benefits as the payouts will soon exceed the income for the SS account? That's probably a "no-no" in national politics. Perhaps a needs-based assessment for benefits would qualify if it sounded smart.

As for my SS, I am determined that my financial plans include forwarding the SS checks to charity.

Any young people out there... learn about and use the "time value of money" and you will do fine.

Monte, if SS has been your only investment for retirement, sorry.

[Monte314]

Monte, if SS has been your only investment for retirement, sorry.

That would be sorry! No, I'm funding my retirement.

[acyckowski]

Valid points all around about what should be (end it, the sooner the better) and the practical reality of life in a republic (not gonna happen, the Gray Party write letters to their representatives and vote in large numbers).

Ideally, I would like to see the government simply pay back the principal and adjust a few years worth of budgets to cover it. Since that's not going to happen, at least allow individual citizens to opt out of it. The politicians love to say that the average citizen won't invest his additional income, and so won't have a pension...fine, but I'm not the average citizen. Give me my money back and I'll live with the consequences.

We ought to transition it from a mandatory retirement plan (with piss-poor payoff on investment) to an optional old-age insurance...there will always be a certain percentage that doesn't plan properly for their retirement, but there will also always be a certain percentage that dies before receiving a penny in Social Security and have nothing of what they contributed to pass to their spouse and adult children. I have little sympathy for the ignorant masses, there's plenty of information out there and library cards are still free.

[Tenacious B]

I'm against Social Security, it is government sanctioned robbery. I might be able to tolerate it if everyone had an individual account that was repaid to them upon retirement, but I could make so much more out of that investment than the government ever could. Not to mention that the government likes having that money to borrow from an accrue interest.

[ScurvyRose]

I think that by the time I receive SS it will cover my grocery bill, and that's about it.

[Mozzes]

I think that by the time I receive SS it will cover my grocery bill, and that's about it.

You'll be lucky if it covers the gas to drive to the grocery store. :p

[ScurvyRose]

You'll be lucky if it covers the gas to drive to the grocery store. :p

Peapod baby! They bring the food to me!