Republicans move to privatize Social Security

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

1. There is no money

2. There is no money

3. There is no money

4. There is no money

5. There is no money because my sig is correct.

There's plenty of money. This is the richest country in the world.

We need to scale back the empire and raise taxes to 1990's levels.

Pretty simple really.

Yeah, simple for an ignorant shit for brains like yourself. Meanwhile, those of us living in the real world understand the problem is far more complex.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

Let’s at least hope they learned their lesson with the RyanCare debacle:

‘Under 55? You just lost your SS retirement; go get a 4th job or work until you’re 90.’

Nice try, Captain Straw Man, but thanks for playing anyway.

 

[rdean]

I love reading these ignorant right wing posts. Their leaders never talk about "investment". They have no concept of "supply and demand". They go on about "capitalism" but don't know what it is, except it's not "socialism".

Then when they do talk about "investing" in Wall Street, they assume they will "make money". Hilarious.

They don't understand these Wall Street guys make their living taking other people's money. Wall Street doesn't make anything. They simply move money around. And Republicans? Can you imagine? These people don't believe science or education but they are going to "outwit" Wall Street and "make a profit"? Hilarious.

Well, at least they gave me one more good belly laugh before I go to bed. Really hilarious.

so Wall Street is the only place to invest?....

Where would you suggest?

 

[rdean]

I might support the idea, but I would WAY more information about the plan first.

1) Where is the money invested

2) How is the money invested (conservative or risky)

3) Can I change how or where the money is invested

4) Can I freely monitor my investment

The list of questions goes on and on. But, if done the right way, I support it.

And when your investments go south when you are 80 years old, what will you do then?

A workable SS system would need to have a combination of an annuity like set which is what we have and an investment which is what is referred to a Privatization.

The investment system should be based like the one where I work. There are various plans all named by the year you hope to retire. If you are invested in the 2060 plan, the investments are higher risk/reward right now. If you are in the 2015, the investments are very low risk/reward. As years pass, the 2060 will look more and more like the 2015.

All of the plans are somewhat diversified. It's simple and self adjusting. This would have the advantage of developing a cash value and delivering to the less advataged a bequest for ther offspring should they die before they retire or before the cash is used.

I was forced into a deduction from payroll at the age of 23 and have been doing so ever since. At that time, it was 2% to go to a "Profit Sharing" account. If that % had been 14%, my retirement right now would be in the millions. Compound interest is the most powerful force in the Universe.

Regardless of any other consideration, making no changes guarentees that the current system will fail and nobody will have anything. This would be a bad thing and is apparently the plan that the Democrats in the Congress endorse.

And a single market crash of 6,000 points, like what happened under bush leave everyone with nothing.

 

[rdean]

The Republicans can't wait for their buddies on Wall Street to get their hands on all that delicious retirement money.

They did so well with their derivatives Ponzi scheme.

Why does your suspiscion of the government handling the monies from Social Security, something the are currently mishandling, not extend to the potential mishandling of the Healthcare Insurance dollars that they covet so strongly?

It ssems pretty well proven to me that any dollar that has passsed through the hands of the elected liars and cheats was likely to be stolen in whole or in part and yet you seem feel that this is not true when discussing sending future dollars to them even though the past dollars sent all prove this point.

Are we to believe that the politicians have been reformed?

Please produce the evidence of this and explain how this is supported by the additional 4 TRILLION dollars of debt racked up over the last two years.

Medicare, which is filled with expensive old people and the disabled and infirm is 3% of GDP. Health care which is filled with healthy people paying into it costs nearly 18% of GDP.
The difference is a "profit motive". Try to figure out why that makes a difference.

The VA, considering one of the best systems in the world spends 94 cents of every dollar on the patients. How much do health care companies spend? How many policies do you have to skim to make a single CEO paycheck of $100,000,000.00?

Answer these questions and you can see where the real debate is.

 

[Sallow]

Great! It's worked for Chile. We should do it.

That's a patently absurd post. It "works" for them..because they had nothing in place before.

So it's better then having nothing. Not better then what we have now.

 

[kiwiman127]

I know of an elderly couple that lost over a million dollars via Enron, which was everything they had. They are now living entirely off Social Security.

Not to sound heartless, but if you have your entire Retirement of 1 Million dollar wrapped up in the stock of 1 Company, You are an idiot.

Yeah, I agree. They were more diversified but if you remember, the Dow dropped drastically from the effect of Enron, World Com;etc. These events happened in a rapid fire succession manner. Many, many people lost everything.

 

[Polk]

Alpo or Fancy Feast?

That wouldn't be the case if you could pull your investments, or switch them to a safer more conservative option.

You mean like govt bonds?

Those work great, unless the government decides to default on them...

 

[elvis]

That wouldn't be the case if you could pull your investments, or switch them to a safer more conservative option.

You mean like govt bonds?

Those work great, unless the government decides to default on them...

is that gonna happen?

 

[Soggy in NOLA]

Republican leaders left Social Security untouched in their House budget this year, but a group of GOP lawmakers are looking to fill the gap themselves with legislation that would create a voluntary privatized version of the program.

Introduced by Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), who also chairs the House's campaign efforts at the NRCC, the "Savings Account For Every American Act" would allow people to immediately opt out of Social Security in favor of a private "S.A.F.E." account. Eventually the program would expand to let employers send their matching contribution to workers' Social Security to a "S.A.F.E." account as well.

"Our nation's Social Security Trust Fund is depleting at an alarming rate, and failure to implement immediate reforms endangers the ability of Americans to plan for their retirement with the options and certainty they deserve," Sessions said of the plan, according to The Hill. "To simply maintain the status quo would weaken American competitiveness by adding more unsustainable debt and insolvent entitlements to our economy when we can least afford it."

House Republicans Look To Privatize Social Security | TPMDC

Why are you left wing lunatics so afraid of people having choices?

 

[Polk]

You mean like govt bonds?

Those work great, unless the government decides to default on them...

is that gonna happen?

I would have laughed someone out of the room had they suggested it a year ago. Now? I'm not so sure.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

Why are you left wing lunatics so afraid of people having choices?

Because the more people who are self reliant, the less who will want government interfering and that results in lost power for politicians.

 

[Mr.Nick]

I am really astounded at how many people on this thread don't know a damn thing about SS. You all should be embarrassed to know so little, after all to keep it safe you should have a working knowledge about how it works.

SS was designed as an insurance program. It covered the old, disabled and minor survivors. It hasn't changed much over the years.

We are now in the 75 yr of SS and they have about a 3% admin cost, which means that for every dollar it takes in .97 cents goes back to the public. Please put this into context with a private company that usually have about 15% admin costs. Most of us that collect SS are happy with the way the money is in the bank on the 3rd of the month, every month, without fail.

Yes, the government has been taking money from the trustfund. BUT it is against the law for them to just take it. They must borrow it and they put government bonds in place. These bonds pay interest and SS has been collecting that interest and putting it back into the trustfund. Those bonds are said to have the full faith and credit of the US government.

Back in 1983 they noticed that the trust fund was getting low and that the baby boomer generation was growing up so Reagan appointed a committee to come up with a solution. They raised the SS tax (FICA) and until just recently we were running a surplus. SS is NOT going broke and is NOT broken. All those cries to fix it are just people preying on your ignorance in order to get their hands on the money.

Here is the SS page on life expectancy. It is much more clear then I could make it.

Life Expectancy for Social Security

If I've missed anything please speak up and I'll try and find an answer, if I don't already know.

No, the government took the SS funds and are now paying those who receive benefits "out of pocket."

There is no SS account - thats been gone for years.

 

[Harry Dresden]

so Wall Street is the only place to invest?....

Where would you suggest?

that Question Mark after the Sentence means i was the one asking the questions here Dean......

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Democrats move to bankrupt Social Security and Medicare

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

Why are you left wing lunatics so afraid of people having choices?

Because the more people who are self reliant, the less who will want government interfering and that results in lost power for politicians.

No one is ‘afraid’ of anyone making a choice, no one is advocating choices not be made available – simply that those who are low income, for whatever reason, have available to them some modicum of support once too old to work.

It’s telling that those on the right think in such extremes: ‘no choice’ or no SS, so blinded by their dogma, that a pragmatic approach is rejected out of hand.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Dems 2008: These two entities—Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—are not facing any kind of financial crisis

Dems 2011: These two entities—Social Security and Medicare—are not facing any kind of financial crisis

 

[Too Tall]

The Republicans can't wait for their buddies on Wall Street to get their hands on all that delicious retirement money.

They did so well with their derivatives Ponzi scheme.

And how well has DC done handling that money? hmmmm? What kind of return we getting?

Whatever DC has done with the money it shouldn't impact SS at all. As long as we are still able to collect the interest on the bonds we'll (SS) stay in good shape.

I am easily confused, but if the government sells a bond to someone, doesn't the government have to PAY interest to the bond holder? And when the bond matures, and the bond holder wants to redeem the bond, where does the government get the money to pay the bond holder?

You indicate that SS collects interest on bonds that they sell, and that makes no sense to a dummy like me.

 

[Too Tall]

And when your investments go south when you are 80 years old, what will you do then?

A workable SS system would need to have a combination of an annuity like set which is what we have and an investment which is what is referred to a Privatization.

The investment system should be based like the one where I work. There are various plans all named by the year you hope to retire. If you are invested in the 2060 plan, the investments are higher risk/reward right now. If you are in the 2015, the investments are very low risk/reward. As years pass, the 2060 will look more and more like the 2015.

All of the plans are somewhat diversified. It's simple and self adjusting. This would have the advantage of developing a cash value and delivering to the less advataged a bequest for ther offspring should they die before they retire or before the cash is used.

I was forced into a deduction from payroll at the age of 23 and have been doing so ever since. At that time, it was 2% to go to a "Profit Sharing" account. If that % had been 14%, my retirement right now would be in the millions. Compound interest is the most powerful force in the Universe.

Regardless of any other consideration, making no changes guarentees that the current system will fail and nobody will have anything. This would be a bad thing and is apparently the plan that the Democrats in the Congress endorse.

And a single market crash of 6,000 points, like what happened under bush leave everyone with nothing.

A market crash to ZERO would leave everyone with nothing. Some people, including me, who invest know what the meaning of dollar cost averaging is, and when the market went to 6400, they kept on doing that and are doing quite well. And, yes I am.

 

[Too Tall]

I think it is a fair trade for not seeing the sick and elderly in the street begging for scraps.

And that was indeed its only original intent.

The original intent was to provide a supplement to the income of the elderly with a government insurance program. It was NEVER intended to be anything else.