Understanding the Social Security scam

[tomdemaine]

You know the money I took when I robbed you well I only needed half of it to buy the crack I wanted to smoke. What should I do with the rest?


Well you could give it back I mean none of it's yours in the first place


Look if you can't come up with anything better than me not mugging you I don't see why we're talking. You may have noticed you didn't stand up to me when I had a knife at your throat.

[Moseley]

[ QUOTE ]
.....after thinking about this some, is that given all the possible things that could be done with the trust fund, the safest and most prudent course would be to lend the money out to the borrower with a minimal amount of default risk. That borrower happens to be the Unitied States government.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really? They have never paid back any of the national debt. We are running a 800b deficit and about 300b is coming from ss tax.
How is the govt going to continue running a deficit, while also coming up with the 300b they will no longer be able to get from the ss tax?

They are probably going to do it by not adjusting the alternative minimum tax, which was created decades ago to tax the rich, but due to inflation will be hitting close to have the taxpayers in a few years.

[TomCollins]

[ QUOTE ]

I see that the only thing you or TomCollins has as an alternative is to get rid of social security. I doubt that anyone else has any other ideas regarding what to do with the excess being paid to the trust fund either btw.

[/ QUOTE ]

Incorrect, as I clearly stated in another post. Of course, I would prefer that there was no social security. However, I think the following alternatives are better than the current system.

[ QUOTE ]
Social Security is not a retirement plan or a welfare plan for poor seniors, it is a government entitlement program funded by revenue to the government. Getting rid of the payroll tax is better than the current system. I think individual accounts would be even better. An opt-out system would be best.

[/ QUOTE ]

So in case that was too confusing, the following is what I would prefer, in order of best to worst. There are some ideas that could be combined, so I didn't make a full matrix.

1) Scrap social security entirely by buying out seniors with annuities.
2) Have social security as an opt-out system paid for by those in the program.
3) Individual accounts where individuals OWN their retirements, but they are controlled by the government.
4) Partial individual control.
5) Current system without payroll taxes.
6) Current system.


And you say I don't have alternatives?

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
.....after thinking about this some, is that given all the possible things that could be done with the trust fund, the safest and most prudent course would be to lend the money out to the borrower with a minimal amount of default risk. That borrower happens to be the Unitied States government.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really? They have never paid back any of the national debt.

[/ QUOTE ]

So you're saying that the U.S. has defaulted on it's bond payments? Wow that's news to me and here I thought that U.S. treasuries were viewed has having essentially no default risk.

[ QUOTE ]
We are running a 800b deficit and about 300b is coming from ss tax.

[/ QUOTE ]

So?

[ QUOTE ]
How is the govt going to continue running a deficit, while also coming up with the 300b they will no longer be able to get from the ss tax?

[/ QUOTE ]

You answered my question with a question which is a non answer, thanks for playing though.


[ QUOTE ]
They are probably going to do it by not adjusting the alternative minimum tax, which was created decades ago to tax the rich, but due to inflation will be hitting close to have the taxpayers in a few years.

[/ QUOTE ]

Whatever but it doesn't answer the question but I realize you have no answer because you don't like the question.

[Moseley]

[ QUOTE ]
How is this any different than the following?

I have two bank accounts, my savings and my "fun money" account. I spend half of my savings account on hookers and blow, but write an IOU from my fun money account to my savings account (plus a little interest).

[/ QUOTE ]

You are so silly.
We are talkin about two govt accounts: the general fund account, which we pay payroll taxes into. payroll taxes are progressive.

And we have a SS account: fueled by a flat tax and is only taxed on the first 97.5k you earn.

Now, if you stop and think for a minute, you should be able to conclude how taking money from the SS account and "loaning" it to the general fund, when you have no way to repay it without raising taxes, is unfair.

It should be a no brainer, if you consider the fact that congress is whining about the fact that come 2017, when the ss tax will be less than the benefits that have to be paid out, that they will have to come up with the difference to start paying back the 3 trillion the general fund owes to the SS Trust fund.

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
You know the money I took when I robbed you well I only needed half of it to buy the crack I wanted to smoke. What should I do with the rest?


Well you could give it back I mean none of it's yours in the first place


Look if you can't come up with anything better than me not mugging you I don't see why we're talking. You may have noticed you didn't stand up to me when I had a knife at your throat.

[/ QUOTE ]

Standard rant by ACist.

[Moseley]

[ QUOTE ]
So you're saying that the U.S. has defaulted on it's bond payments? Wow that's news to me and here I thought that U.S. treasuries were viewed has having essentially no default risk.

[/ QUOTE ]

Of course not. They issue more bonds to retire the bonds outstanding and fuel the current deficit.

I know you're smart enough to realize that.

You are such a silly person, who must spend a lot of time trolling this site looking for fights.

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

I see that the only thing you or TomCollins has as an alternative is to get rid of social security. I doubt that anyone else has any other ideas regarding what to do with the excess being paid to the trust fund either btw.

[/ QUOTE ]

Incorrect, as I clearly stated in another post. Of course, I would prefer that there was no social security. However, I think the following alternatives are better than the current system.

[ QUOTE ]
Social Security is not a retirement plan or a welfare plan for poor seniors, it is a government entitlement program funded by revenue to the government. Getting rid of the payroll tax is better than the current system. I think individual accounts would be even better. An opt-out system would be best.

[/ QUOTE ]

So in case that was too confusing, the following is what I would prefer, in order of best to worst. There are some ideas that could be combined, so I didn't make a full matrix.

1) Scrap social security entirely by buying out seniors with annuities.
2) Have social security as an opt-out system paid for by those in the program.
3) Individual accounts where individuals OWN their retirements, but they are controlled by the government.
4) Partial individual control.
5) Current system without payroll taxes.
6) Current system.


And you say I don't have alternatives?

[/ QUOTE ]

Alternatives with what to do with the excess money being paid to the trust fund. I already realize that you'd like to change the system drastically. I would too but that's not what I was asking.

Edit: I'd be interested in knowing if you though SS would be significantly less of a scam if the excess money was lent to the European Economic Union. I realize that maintaining the current system is your least preferred alternative and this wouldn't change that.

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
So you're saying that the U.S. has defaulted on it's bond payments? Wow that's news to me and here I thought that U.S. treasuries were viewed has having essentially no default risk.

[/ QUOTE ]

Of course not. They issue more bonds to retire the bonds outstanding and fuel the current deficit.

[/ QUOTE ]

Corporations do this all the time and have capital structures that are such they constantly have debt on their balance sheets. So what/

[ QUOTE ]
I know you're smart enough to realize that.

You are such a silly person, who must spend a lot of time trolling this site looking for fights.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm trolling? You reponded to a post where I asked a specific question that you apparently don't want to answer. Why respond to my post then?

[mosdef]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
A good explanation of why natedogg's so wrong about the government "lending to itself". Its done all the time at the personal level.

[/ QUOTE ]

The problem with it is that the ssi tax has a cap of 97.5k and it use to be less. Couple that with the fact that there have been years where the ss tax paid for 1/2 the deficit and you can see how the middle class bore the bulk of the general budget's deficit.

In fact, Clinton claimed to have balanced the budget one year, when it fact, it took about 300b of ssi taxes to make up the deficit spending from the general budget.

Now 1/2 of that 300b was paid by individuals and the other 1/2 by the employer.

Those who made less than 97.5k were taxed on 100% of their money for ss and had the excess given to the general fund in exchange for IOUs which cannot be repaid without raising taxes, or cutting spending dramatically.

A football player, making 2m a year, paid ss taxes on 5% of his income, and therefore paid a lot loss (as a percentage of his gross income) than a college grad working in the computer field, pulling in 97.5k a year.

In addition, taxes on gasoline are by law, to be used only for infrastructure. It is a regressive tax and it is also running a surplus that congress has to maintain the "books" for and "pay back."

Just another way to tax the middle class for the purpose of paying the deficit.

That's the problem.

[/ QUOTE ]

Which "that" are you referring to - that the SS accumulated taxes are allowed to pay for programs other than SS, or that the cap is $98K?