It's that time again! Bring on the Righteous-Indignation-Batshit-Crazy-Wingnut Bulk Emails!
In my box this AM:
Have you noticed, your Social Security check is now referred to as a 'Federal Benefit Payment'?
I'll be part of the one percent to forward this.
I am forwarding it because it touches a nerve in me, and I hope it will in you. (wtmusic: 
)
Please keep passing it on until everyone in our country has read it. (wtmusic: no really, I'm that important).
The government is now referring to our Social Security checks as a 'Federal Benefit Payment.'
This isn’t a benefit – its earned income!
Not only did we all contribute to Social Security but our employers did too.
(blahblahblahblahfillintheblanksblahblahblah...)
Then call it what it is:
Our Earned Retirement Income.
Email provides a link to Snopes, but assumes (for the most part, correctly) that people won't read it. My bulk reply:
Read Snopes:
"It's true that Social Security retirement payments are classified as 'federal benefit payments,' but this terminology is not new: the word 'benefits' has been applied to Social Security retirement payments since the Social Security program was enacted in the 1930s.
The terminology is also not unique to Social Security retirement payments, as the phrase 'federal benefit payments' applies to a broad class of payments made to (or on behalf of) individuals under federal government programs – everything from Social Security Disability Insurance to Medicare to farm subsidies are considered 'federal benefit payments.' The fact that workers themselves contribute much of the money that goes into the Social Security retirement fund doesn't affect its classification as a benefit.
Likewise, the word 'entitlement' has long been the standard terminology for payments made under government programs that guarantee and provide benefits to particular groups. Persons who have demonstrated their eligibility to claim such payments are entitled (i.e., 'qualified for by right according to law') to receive them. The usage has nothing to do with pejorative connotations associated with the word (e.g., 'a sense of entitlement') which are often applied to denote people expecting or demanding something they do not merit.
As for the calculations about savings detailed in the latter half of the above-quoted example, they're far off the mark. Social Security contributions from individuals and employers combined have never 'totaled 15% of your income before taxes'; the current level is 12.4%, and historically the contribution rates have been significantly less."
Bottom line - nothing new. This is just another attempt by Republicans to smear Obama because their own candidate sucks so bad.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/taxes/benefit.asp
= new reply since forum marked as read
