[Principled]

SS and MC can be funded differently.

The whole income/payroll tax scheme doesn't work, obviously.

There is a more stable, broader base that is better for funding MC/SS.

A national retail sales tax would collect from everyone, not just wage earners. It would collect from illegals, every time they spend. It would collect from drug dealers, every time they spend. And, most importantly, IMO, is that all imports would pay the tax too.

For a quick rundown of a national retail sales tax, already in Congress with 32 cosponsors, look here.

Add that the IRS would go away, and it's kewl!

[Malsua]

>>The whole income/payroll tax scheme doesn't work, obviously.<<

Currently, Social Security is a transfer program. Fica takes from workers and gives to non workers who have retired. Not against giving non-workers a benefit. To get SS, they must have worked at least 10 years.

The problem comes in that there are more payers right now than there will be in 20 years. Right now it takes 3 payers to transfer cash to 1 non payer retired person. Great! If you retire right now. In 20-30 years when I will retire, there won't be 3 payers. There will be 1 payer.

I won't see the same benefit. In fact, I don't expect I will even have my 401k. I think I'm going to live on dog food when I retire despite saving $100 now and for the next 30 years.

-Mal

[dirtboy]

There is a more stable, broader base that is better for funding MC/SS.

I've got a better approach - shift it all to a minimal safety net with means testing. It has to change sooner or later, if we change it now then the pain is spread around more evenly.

[dirtboy]

There is a more stable, broader base that is better for funding MC/SS.

I've got a better approach - shift it all to a minimal safety net with means testing. It has to change sooner or later, if we change it now then the pain is spread around more evenly.

[tob2]

This is one Medicare recepient who is not in favor of Bush's proposed Medicare drug benefit. It will cost me much more money than I am now spending on medication. A national sales tax looks promising because disabled people have to buy things like food and household products. We would be refinancing the system every time we purchased anything. Also, it would eliminate one of the grossest forms of greed, CORPORATE GREED!

[Taxman]

I am outraged that the Republicans are going along with Teddy Kennedy's "good down payment" socialist scheme.

The Heritage Foundation has for years promoted the substitution of the FEHAB (Federal Employee Health and Benefits?) plan as a substitute for Medicare/Medicaid, and the Republicans were working to that end.

Somewhere along the line, the wheels came off and the Democrat plan was substituted.

If this plan becomes law, it will, over time, bankrupt the United States of America, which may, (muttering darkly) be the whole point of this exercise.