I have a problem with the whole social security issue....

[truhavoc]

This is an issue I have been trying to cope with, because I want to be part of the unified front against the republican push to repeal the entire new deal. I am 23, the target age for this plan that the repugs have been trying to shove down our throats. My generation has "heard" for years that social security is not going to be there when we graduate. The battle for public opinion has already been lost when in comes to the majority of my generation, we are just lucky by having groups like AARP on our side to keep it all a stalemate.

As far as I can tell the current "plan", that does not even exist yet, has a number of shortcomings. I do think we have an opportunity here to improve social security to an even better system, instead of undermining its foundation. Mayber we should attempt like what Clinton did in his final term to use the power of the stock market in order to maximize the gains for the system. As for the republican ideal, I have a hard time seeing where the additional money for these accounts which turn the program from insurance to investment account. If everyone can pass their earnings on to next generations and such this means that everyone will be drawing benefits, has there been any proof that the investment profit on this new plan would increase returns that much?

Also many of us make jokes about betting all the money on "red" when it comes to talking about the results of a major change like this. I do not feel that any plan would allow people to make foolish choices with their money. I think sometimes it hurts our position to be incorrect in the framing of it. But nonetheless, there are profits to be made by Wall Street on this republican deal that we need to be able to shift back into the system. I am thinking of sort of a national investment fund. This fund would be managed by a select group of experts who would work to maximize the returns of the money. This would take the guesswork away from the average citizen, remove the profit on the system away from Wall Street, and create some more well-paying government jobs while improving the system without making any of the "necessary" cuts we hear so much about.

[lonestarnot]

1. And because you have questions, you'd leave it to bushitler to figure out?

NOT NOT NOT. He can't figure his way out of a fucking paper bag! Let's fix it not do away with it! It is a scare tactic just like everything else he does. He said it was going bust in 78 or 79 when he ran for office.

[truhavoc]

4. Of course not

I think we should just take the opportunity to fix it instead of allowing time for the repugs to frame us as being against the public will. I think if we put together a concrete plan to fix the system then at least you would not hear from them that "at least they are trying to fix it".

[lonestarnot]

7. Saw Hillary on C-Span yesterday... she mentioned a calculator on a

website where you could calculate under their plan and the present plan, but didn't catch the site as was doing stuff. Will try to find it for you.

[LynnTheDem]

11. Social Security calculator; how much will you lose?

http://democrats.senate.gov/ss/calc.html#

[lonestarnot]

14. Thanks Lynn the Dem! Trying to do to many things at once this a.m. n/t

[LynnTheDem]

21. No problem :)

I know how those days are, lol!

[LynnTheDem]

8. Did you know; keeping bush's TEMPORARY tax cuts as TEMPORARY

for the richest 1% of Americans (instead of making the cuts permanent, as bush is insisting on) that would fully fund social security until the 22nd century?

Did you know; the cost to fully fund SS until the 22nd century is LESS THAN 1% of GDP?

Did you know; the cost to fully fund SS until the 22nd century is LESS than what we're paying out now for invading & occupying Iraq?

Did you know; you would receive MORE BENEFITS by DOING NOTHING WHATSOEVER to social security than you would receive under bush's "plan" to "fix" social security?

Did you know; in 1978 bush said SS would be "bankrupt within the next 10 years" if we didn't privatize social security?

Did you know; social security WILL NOT be "bankrupt by 2042"?

[jdj]

24. I think it will be 80 or 90% in the red by then.

and that's only if they haven't monkeyed the numbers some other way.

The scary thing is, Krugman says we WILL be in trouble with medicare and medicaid alot sooner.

[July]

26. Remember when BushCo was selling the tax cuts?

IIRC, they got some of the Congressional foot-draggers on board by emphasizing that the tax cuts were temporary, as you point out.

Of course, since they lie as easily as they breathe, we knew (yet the Congress-fools didn't) that they just wanted a foot in the door and would push to make the cuts permanent, which is what they're doing today.

I wish the Democratic leadership would bring this right out in the open. "When the tax cuts expire, PROBLEM SOLVED."

[blondeatlast]

22. Note my signature line; it's the Democrats' official battle cry.

And if the tour goes to your area, GO.

[jdj]

23. we can easily fix it by taxing the first $120,000 instead of the first

$90,000. But that cuts into Bush's up and coming wannabe base, and it won't make his stockbroker buddies trillions of dollars (and that's not an exaggeration) like this current swindle will.

You cannot bank on the stock market.

And someone posted a benefit calculator (I think from democrats.org) and it calculated that I would see a 21% drop in my bennies from this.

[DemBones DemBones]

2. Just know this: the GOP has been trying to kill off Social Security since

it began. That's all you really need to know.

[Wright Patman]

3. GOP investment banking/brokerage houses

are never going to go for your idea of creating more high-paying "government" jobs to oversee a "national investment fund." That doesn't generate any fees for them. Where do you think the push for this came from in the first place? Research what *'s grandfather did for a living.

As Art Bell said last night, the reason this has to be done RIGHT NOW is to shift the blame to the peons when their stock market "personal account" investments inevitably crash. This country is headed toward the same kind of financial meltdown which afflicted the German Weimar Republic and led to Hitler. What is different is that we did this to ourselves. There was no Treaty of Versailles imposing harsh armistice terms to cause it. In fact, we "won" the Cold War. Remember?

I know Bell is no financial expert, just a multimillionaire radio host, and I understand he was going to spend the rest of his program attempting to debunk the LIHOP/MIHOP theories of 9-11, which proves he is not nearly as much into "conspiratology" as many thought. Frankly, it doesn't take more than an afternoon's study of what occurred in the months leading up to 9-11 and on that day to conclude that it certainly WAS at least a LIHOP operation on the part of our federal government.

[etherealtruth]

6. I haven't heard an independent economist...

... or financial expert verify that SS is in much trouble. My (possibly simplistic ) question is: Why not raise the cap?----- The cap was set in the 70's or 80's, when ~$90,000 represented more wealth than it does today. Couple this with a law barring "raiding" of SS, and I don't understand why there would be a problem in the foreseeable future.

May I also echo a previous comment: The Repub's have been trying to dismantle SS since it's inception.

[gorbal]

5. Would this be the end of Welfare as we know it?

Okay, here is my question; Would this be the end of welfare as we know it? I have not read the entire bill, or tried to figure out their BS.

[kohodog]

9. There is no bill to read

Bush wants consensus to destroy SS and then he will craft a bill that is far worse than anyone has imagined. Medicare prescription drugs and a billion dollar windfall for Pharma. This will be a Trillion dollar windfall for Wallstereet before they're done.

[lonestarnot]

10. Welfare... ! This not fucking welfare! What are you talking about???n/t

[gorbal]

16. What I mean is

What other programs will this deal with besides social security for elders.

[lonestarnot]

17. you're leaving out survivors (children and widows), disabled, and what do

you want old people on a stick with that mustard?

[sinkingfeeling]

12. The real problem with Social Security is that it has been paid by

contributors as a separate tax (FICA) since 1935, but that revenue has not been set aside in a separate fund , which could have been used as an investment vehicle. The revenue has been 'taken' into the general fund and spent (military, roads, etc.) and in its place the government has provided 'special' T-bonds or IOUs. I think over the years, there's about $3.7 trillion involved. Now as us baby boomers approach retirement they are talking about the fact that by 2018, more money will be going out than coming in...which is really just saying that the national deficit will be larger since its all the same money!

Now if our government honors those special T-bonds, the system is good
until 2052 or 2042, depending on who you believe...but both projections
use extremely grim financial forecasts. Of course, if the gov't. doesn't
it means the complete melt-down of the US economy and then the entire
world's!! If the same rosy forecasts being used to promote private
accounts were used for the Social Security fund, it would be sol event
until 2075 and beyond.

So the problem is how to get revenue up while the largest payouts are going on...us boomers will be dying off in the 2020's. Question how
Bush can accomplish that while taking 4 per cent out of the stream.
They never mention the cost of administration (profit to the favored
few) which could be 10 to 15% (based on UK experience), the cost of
the annuity each private account holder will have to buy as they
near retirement, nor hardly, the severe reduction you would have to
the SS benefit.

The solution should be simple...stop using SS funds in the general
budget and lift the $90,000 cap on who pays into SS. We were told
in 1983 when Alan Greenspan first came on the scene, that the increase
in the FICA tax and increase in the retirement age would cover the
baby boom. I have paid into Social Security for 46 years, so far,
and paid up to the cap for 30 years. I've already been burnt by
the corporation I worked 30 years for when they changed from a 'defined' benefit pension and that is exactly what Bush&co want to do to SS.

[lonestarnot]

15. Yes so maybe one solution is bar the access gate from borrowning

from the GD fund! bushitler takes whatever isn't nailed down!

[sandnsea]

19. Roll back the tax cuts to the wealthy

And make them pay back the WORKING people for the FICA surpluses that Bush gave to the wealthy in the first place.

If I had "T-Bonds" sitting in my drawer, I wouldn't call them a bunch of IOU's. I'd expect my money to be paid back. Especially if I knew the govt had just given the wealthy more than enough in tax cuts to pay it back. And that if those tax cuts weren't made permanent, there'd be more than enough to pay them back too.

I cannot believe how many Democrats are buying into this IOU shit while forgetting about Bush's trillions of dollars of tax cuts.

[sadiesworld]

20. When you suggest that the cap be raised...

are you proposing a limit? Will benefits increase for those making over $90K?

[sinkingfeeling]

25. I am suggesting that the cap be eliminated. Benefits are currently

impacted by your wages, but that doesn't mean that because you pay into SS way more than the Wal-Mart worker, that the benefit is proportionally better. One of the beautiful things about SS is that it is progressive.

[sendero]

13. What we know of the plan right now..

... makes it clear - it wouldn't fix anything. Your returns would be capped at a low level. Your retirement would be subject to the whims of "the market".

This is what I think: nobody, whether they are 20 or 50 should be counting on SS to retire on. Yes, you will get something but the amount is indeterminate, no matter what kind of structural changes are made in SS because nobody can predict what the economy will be doing in 40 years, period.

There are already vehicles to save for your retirement - such as IRAs. If you start this year putting the max allowed into an IRA every year, you will be ok.

SS is a supplemental income stream for seniors. I pity those who rely on it solely, it was never intended to do that in the first place.

[bleedingheart]

18. I think that people already have a chance to invest and save

Social Security is the safety net for those that either choose not to do any of those things or completely bet on the wrong horse.

Diverse portfolios are a good thing.

I think the republicans have been marketing this Social Security deceptively. They keep implying that the Government should be controlling your money ...that you could be making more more more!!!

However they ignore the fact that SS was created to be the safety net. It wasn't supposed to be the sole source of your retirment income, if anything it was supposed to be the last piece.