Posted on 01/20/2019 9:08:11 PM PST by rintintin
The Seniors Center announces more than 373,000 Americans have signed their Trust Fund Emergency Petition to date. The nonprofit senior's advocacy organization is well on its way to reaching its goal of 1,000,000 petitions.
The Seniors Center and a grassroots army of activists have collected 373,546 signatures from 49 states and 433 Congressional districts. Online activists have taken to social media to help The Seniors Center reach its goal.
"We're seeing comments on Facebook and Twitter–even Pinterest," said Dan Perrin, President of The Seniors Center. "In the last month, over 1,000 people have left comments online and we're getting hundreds of new signatures every day. A lot of these people have never participated in grassroots advocacy. Now they're making their voices heard with passion."
The Trust Fund Emergency Petition to Congress is the cornerstone campaign of The Seniors Center's push to dramatically change the way the federal government handles Social Security investment and financing. Signers seek to change the laws requiring Social Security surplus funds be invested in Treasury bills and to redeem and return these funds to a physical trust account for retirees.
(Excerpt) Read more at prnewswire.com ...
I just did some quick research and I think a lot of people gets confused about “trust fund” or “lockbox” or whatever you want to call “it”. From what I have read SS was mostly a “pay-as-you-go” system for 50 years or so (outgoes roughly equal to income)(via SS/FICA taxes) then in the early ‘80’s changes were made (FICA tax increased mostly) that allowed SS to run fairly large surpluses (instead of a significant deficit in 1983). Rather than let these surpluses “sit around” not collecting interest they are invested in T-Bills....this revenue is then by definition “spendable” by Congress/”the government”. This constitutes what a lot of people yell about as “they spent the $ in the trust fund and repaid with notes/debt!!” The counter to that is “what do you propose...getting NO interest on the surplus money & just let it sit in the trust fund?” (about $83 billion in interest per year for the last few years @ about 2.5%-3%). “So raided the trust fund” is a bit of a misnomer to say the least. The $$ is in T-bills that get cashed in as needed to pay people’s SS checks.
Congress officially BORROWED the money from the SS trust fund with IOUs - like bond instruments - promising to repay the money. If you’re ok with Congress reneging on that debt, then you should also be ok with the government not paying on any bonds that might be in your retirement account. You apparently think government should be allowed to steal money under the guise of borrowing it
/good comment.
It is stealing, and if you doubt that, you should crack open a dictionary.
(Wordnik)
steal
v. To take (the property of another) without right or permission.
(Miriam-Webster)
v. to take the property of another wrongfully and especially as a habitual or regular practice
The only way you could dispute that taxes are stealing is if you think the government has the *right* to take your property - in which case, I don’t see what grounds you have to complain it took your property.
Oops, forgot some links for my post #41:
https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ProgData/fundFAQ.html
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL33028.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_Trust_Fund
What was stolen was people’s social security taxes. Supposed to be used for social security, they were “borrowed” for other uses, like the Iraq War. And you don’t want them repaid. You want the borrowing to become a theft.
Repaying you requires stealing from the next generation who won’t get paid no way no how and they know it and you know it.
This debt falls into a class called “odious” and no it should not be repaid. Those who let the government spend their retirement should ultimately eat the loss for their mistake and have not even the slightest right to ask later generations who had no say in the matter whatsoever to take responsibility for their mistake.
You made the mistake. You trusted thieves. You are now realizing that that mistake has consequences, and in your rage against this injustice are proposing that the injustice be against someone else.
The injustice doesn’t go away and can’t go away. It’s only a question of whose ox gets gored. You’d rather it be someone else and you don’t care who, which is an extremely immoral position.
That’s called “money laundering” under any other circumstance.
Sorta....the money wasn’t “dirty” to start with...so no laundering needed! ;-) The SS trust fund could alway invest their “surplus” on Wall Street/stocks I guess...that way Congress couldn’t borrow against it....but then something like 2008 happens and people freak out.
Duh.
Government has no .Money of its own.
Socialist security steals from one group to pay another.
Stealing the future to pay for the past
Well, the people who depleted the ‘trust fund’ are the ones these seniors collectively voted for through most of their lives.
So, technically, if they want it refilled, the proper way would be to cut off their benefits, so that kids today will again have a trust fund (for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to raid).
Repaying you requires stealing from the next generation
No more than paying off government bonds does. Stealing is when government - or anyone else - refuses to pay people from whom it borrowed money. I take it you and your family are ok with not being paid for any govt bonds in your IRA or 401k
Ping
>> Repaying you requires stealing from the next generation
> No more than paying off government bonds does.
We are indeed talking about stealing in both cases, equally - of a particularly disgraceful sort, stealing from one’s own posterity!
Now that we agree on this, let me offer some advice: “Thou Shalt Not Steal”.
If you adhere to that advice, you will try to find some solution that doesn’t involve becoming a thief, yourself, accepting that your losses are your own and not another’s to bear.
If you discard that advice, you are no better than those who stole from you, and deserve no sympathy.
Fifty years ago.
https://www.ssa.gov/history/BudgetTreatment.html
In early 1968 President Lyndon Johnson made a change in the budget presentation by including Social Security and all other trust funds in a”unified budget.” This is likewise sometimes described by saying that Social Security was placed “on-budget.”
One way to estimate the immediate impact of this accounting change is to look at the government’s actual expenditures for FY 1969. Under the current unified budget rules, the government reported a surplus of $3.2 billion for FY 1969. Removing the “off-budget” items from the calculation would result in a net deficit of $507 million.
Source: Historical Tables: Budget of the U.S. Government, Fiscal Year 2006, Table 1.1, pg. 22.
> Well, the people who depleted the ‘trust fund’ are the ones these seniors collectively voted for through most of their lives.
Precisely. They are the ones who let the situation occur.
I’m old enough to have witnessed them be perfectly fine with people my age (40s) and younger getting 100% screwed out of 100% of their Social Security promises, for three decades and still counting.
They have had no problem all along with the rest of us getting screwed - in fact, they made broaching that subject the single most untouchable political topic for the entire time!
Notice that he ain’t breathed a word of sympathy for those younger than he who have always known we were getting screwed by SS. He cares for himself, and only for himself, and that extreme sociopathic quality that infests a disproportionate percentage of his generation is exactly how this mess came to pass in the first place.
Don’t know what to tell him other than “Sorry old man. You don’t get to spend your kids’ money three times, and you’ve already spent it twice.”
So basically it happened as soon as the people now suddenly complaining about their SS were old enough to vote.
The “Me” generation could use some long hard self-reflection. It seems they have no idea the rest of us are fully aware that we are cleaning up the mess they made for us and are not happy about it at all.
I’m certainly not going to remain silent if they try to skip out on repaying their borrowing.....Well start squawking cause it already happened.
The privateized part of SS (Title V) was aborted.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2005/05/roosevelts_social_security_pla.html
As Wimpy would say, “I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.”
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.