Bull - if SS were used ONLY to pay retirement benefits and ONLY in a quantity previously funded by what that INDIVIDUAL has paid in, then there's plenty of money in the program. If they're going to stop paying out selectively, then they should start with all the other payouts that they now provide (surviving spouse, disability, etc.) and reduce outlays to those that paid so little into the system in their productive years that they are essentially collecting welfare.
If it's acting like a welfare program, then fix it so that it isn't a welfare program. Don't make it even more of one. Bottom line is that there should be NO redistribution involved with SS.
Wealthy seniors should be forced to take a buyout equal to the amount of money they put in over the years, plus a reasonable amount of interest.
I'm far from wealthy, but I'd glady take a refund with interest over the financial raping that this communist is proposing. His definition of "wealthy" will undoubtedly include anybody with over $100K in their 401, and/or a pension.
Sorry, but the math doesn't lie. Social Security already pays out more in benefits than is collected in Social Security taxes. This trend is only going to continue as more people lose their jobs and as more people start collecting benefits.
If they're going to stop paying out selectively, then they should start with all the other payouts that they now provide (surviving spouse, disability, etc.) and reduce outlays to those that paid so little into the system in their productive years that they are essentially collecting welfare.
Agreed 100%. I just think Social Security should be ended for anyone 40 and under. All the money we pay into the system now is wasted and assuming things do not change, this program will NOT be there when we get to retirement age. Social Security has already reached the tipping point, and like all ponzi schemes, it is collapsing.
I think the best way to get rid of Social Security for good is to simply end it for those of us 40 and under, and provide a means to pay a lower level of benefits for those who are older than 40, and simply pay the existing obligations to the elderly out of the general fund. As they die off, so will all Social Security obligations.
My Dad worked and paid a lot into the system. My Mom didn't work, and raised us kids instead. When my Dad died suddenly at age 56, my Mom had to take a minimum wage job because had basically no work experience. What would you have suggested happen to my Dad's SS payments that now go to my Mom, instead of actually benifitting the woman who raised his kids instead of fulfilling her own career aspirations?
No, there isn’t sufficient money “in” Social Security to meet future liabilities as the program is structured now.
First of all, there are so many misconceptions about what Social Security is and isn’t here on this thread it makes me want to scream.
What Social Security is:
1. An entitlement. If you meet the benefit class qualifications, you are entitled to the benefit. It is therefore NOT welfare, which is means tested.
If Social Security were to become means-tested (ie, disallow “the wealthy” from collecting), then it would become a welfare program. The reason why the Democrats do NOT want means-testing of entitlement benefits is that it devolves their most popular program into a mere welfare scheme, and people won’t and don’t like paying into welfare schemes. The cunning scheme of the Social Security fraud in the first place was the entitlement aspect, where so many people were duped into thinking that what is basically a ponzi scheme was “their money.”
2. There is no such thing as a Social Security “fund.” There is no pot of money that is set aside for “Social Security” or “Medicare,” “Medicaid” or any of the other entitlement schemes. They’re all structured like a ponzi scheme, where new people paying into the “fund” are providing the funds which are used to pay out the benefits being withdrawn by currently elegible people.
Like a Ponzi scheme, the “pay-as-you-go” entitlement schemes (as they’re now structured all over the OEDC 12 countries) are facing the exact same problem(s) as any ponzi scheme faces when it hits the wall: a declining number of new “investors” paying in money to pay out to the people who got in early. This problem is NOT unique to the US. Japan, much of western Europe, the US and the Scandinavian countries are facing the same big problem to greater or lesser extents: a “baby boomer” bulge of claimants is becoming eligible to withdraw funds from the systems at the same time two other problems are converging: rapidly rising costs of medical care and rapidly rising life expectancies.
3. The money paid into Social Security in excess of benefit withdrawals from the 60’s through about 2007 was spent on everything else by the government. The surplus is gone. Spent. Frittered away on everything else by loaning it to the “general fund” by buying Treasury debt as we were engaged in deficit spending. As the Social Security fund pays out more money than it takes in, the “fund” will pull Treasury notes and bonds out of their filing cabinets and redeem them, which will increase the amount of money that the US Treasury needs to raise in new debt.
4. When Social Security was first structured, the age 65 was the median life expectancy of men in the US. This means that HALF of adult males were DEAD by the age 65. That solved a whole lot of mathematical issues of a ponzi scheme - structuring the benefit starting age at such a point where the pool of eligible claimants was going to start declining rapidly.
Today, the median life expectancy of men in the US is 75+ years (for males born today) and the life expectancy for females born today is over 80.
In 1900, the life expectancy for males born in the US was something like 49 years.
Right there is THE crux of the problem. The “Grey Panther” movement of the 70’s and their red welfare warrior, Claude Pepper, fought tooth and nail to prevent raising the retirement age of SS/Medicare/Medicaid to keep track with the rapid rise in life expectancy. Now we’re in a situation where we have to cram 40 years of adjustments into a very small period of time. In 1950, there were over 16 people paying into Social Security for every senior withdrawing benefits, and today there’s only about 3.3 people paying into SS for every person withdrawing benefits. There is NO way that the math of this continues working as the Boomer Bulge starts rapidly increasing the number of claimants on the system while we have no rapid increase in the number of people paying into the system.
What we have always had in Social Security is a transfer of money from the younger generation who is paying into the program to the old people who are withdrawing money from the program. There is no account “set aside,” there is no “lock box,” there is nothing but accounting sleights of hand at the US Treasury and Social Security administration as to where the money comes in and goes out.
I wish that it was. Even the currently legislated benefits don't match the actual value of the contributions (plus interest) unless you live to about age 120.
If they're going to stop paying out selectively, then they should start with all the other payouts that they now provide (surviving spouse, disability, etc.) and reduce outlays to those that paid so little into the system in their productive years that they are essentially collecting welfare.
There's nothing wrong with survivor payments as long as it's done on an actuarially sound basis. Traditional defined-benefit pension plans have that option: you just have to specify it when you start receiving benefits.
The monthly benefit is then calculated based on BOTH the age of the pensioner and the spouse, and set accordingly to reflect the average life expectancy of both.