[[So it can be dismantled, and a real system built to take its place, without hurting any beneficiaries now or in the future.]]
I don’t see how it can be done unless there is a large enough ratio of workers to non workers- (unless there is some way to invest the money for large enough gains to be able to pay people more than they put into the system like SS does- but the SS model relies on a good number of folks paying in but not living long enough to collect)
[[The *only* player that does get hurt is the government, by being denied “free money to wasteâ€. Something I think we can all live with.]]
I agree with that- but really, the government won’t be ‘hurt’- they will just be losing something that isn’t theirs to begin with, and will have to quit funding useless programs like federally funded studies, stop paying hundreds of billions of dollars for illegals, stop sending terrorist nations hundreds of billions of dollars etc- The free for all spending spree has to stop-
we gave the government a credit card, and they are being grotesquely irresponsible with it- The system was fine when it went to helping those who truly neede3d it like the elderly, the sick, and even helping single moms get back o n their feet with temporary help- And I think most healthy working people would feel we as a nation have an obligation to help those who can’t help themselves very well- but liberals have so perverted the system that now everyone and their brother is on welfare, illegals are on it, nearly 70% of ALL immigrants (legal and illegal combined) are on it whether they are able bodied or not- millions who aren’t disabled are now on disability-
This is what broke the system and overwhelmed it financially— Had it remained available only for the truly needy, and the retired, there would be plenty of money
I agree something has to be done now, but we must make sure that retirees, and the disabled and veterans are taken care of while transitioning- I know many disabled and elderly that get by on as little as $650 a month- and they are just barely surviving- (many do get more, but many folks only worked min wage jobs all their lives and ended up getting below poverty SS or Disability when they became disabled and couldn’t work any longer)
The whole deal with SS was that it works like health insurance used to work- people would pick up health insurance, pay in their whole lives, and need it only briefly at the end, or die suddenly and not use it- this is what keeps the industry alive (well, that and insurance claims adjusters denying payments for certain cases)- The4 whole idea of course is to get more coming in than is going out-, and for that you need lots of people involved to get the averages in favor of those who need it In the end-
With individual plans, you don’t have that advantage- there’s just what the individual puts in, and it usually won’t be enough to keep them for the rest of their lives ocne they retire, and so many will go to nursing homes and end up costing loads to the government who have now lost the income from SS
Meh- it’s complicated- I’m no financial guru that’s for sure-
At its very beginning, SS was cringe worthy, for several reasons. Rational people described it as a way for minimum wage workers, with no other means of retirement, could have a retirement. Certainly not salaried people.
However, it was passed by its advocates with the idea of nationalizing all retirements under the government umbrella. So, in a manner of speaking, it was created with the duplicity of Obamacare, an effort to nationalize health care. Included in the deal was the national identification number system on Social Security cards, that they swore up and down would *never* be used for identification.
It was created smack dab in the middle of the New Deal, in 1935, when congress was heavily Democrat, and there had already been many socialist and fascist-style schemes foisted on America.
There had already been the agricultural equivalent of the “red terror” with federal officers going from farm to farm, killing livestock and destroying crops. On top of the Great Depression, it broke the will of most to resist.