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Bullshit!
If I had the money that was contributed in my name, I could have over $2,000,000 in principle built up at this point.
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http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/file/60391/download?token=rxBb5nLq
I doubt it. Use the link above to figure it out. Or just look at your account at the gov website and you can look up your contributions. Dont forget to make sure any stated rate include the employers portion since that is money you earned.
I think the original poster is referring to what he could have done with the money if it had been invested in an IRA or 401(k), in a balance of equities and bonds. Depending on your average wage income, that's a reasonable amount.
I've actually calculated my investment balance if I had invested my Social Security contributions myself. But, I "invested" them into 30-year Treasury Bonds, at the average rate for that calendar year. So, this isn't hypothetical -- it's the closest analogue I could find to the special obligation bonds in the Social Security Trust Fund.
I'd have about $1 million in my account right now. By the time I started withdrawing benefits, the balance would be about $1.5 million. And if I withdrew the same benefits paid to me by Social Security, I'd exhaust them the year I turned 95.
(An aside: I assumed an average 4% dividend yield and 3% inflation for future years. The actual amounts may be incorrect, but the difference (1%) between the yield and inflation matches historical values.)
However, I could have done MUCH better if I had simply invested the money in an S&P 500 index fund. If I wanted to reduce volatility, I could have split them between an S&P 500 index fund and an intermediate bond fund, and rebalance them to 50-50 once a year. I haven't tried to calculate the actual balance, but it could easily be twice the bond-only balance.