What if you learned that the richest U.S. demographic group was getting mountains of government benefits, for which they paid a bit - but nowhere near what they are reaping - and they are implicitly threatening every U.S. elected official with being tossed out of office if they even HINT of fucking with their benefits. And the elected officials cower at their threats.
Retired White People are, on average, rolling in money, but they revel in lavish financial benefits paid for by everyone else. They own their own homes outright, they have zero or near-zero debt, they have seven-figure IRA's, plus other investments in stocks, bonds, real estate, and grandiose personal possessions like boats, expensive cars, timeshares in tropical resorts, jewelry and furs. Spend some time in Florida this time of year and it will turn your stomach. Trendy restaurants surrounded by expensive European, American, and Japanese luxury cars, while their owners - gray-hairs all - sit and get themselves plastered while stuffing themselves on hundred-dollar dinners. Million-dollar condo's by the thousands, all occupied - part time, if you please - by mainly-northern Retired White People. One cannot even imagine what their Real Home looks like back in New Jersey. Go on a cruise sometime. RWP's populate all of them, many doing several 5-figure cruises a year - they have nothing else to do.
Not all RWP's are rich, of course. Many were working class, supported families, put their kids through college at great personal sacrifice, or just didn't manage to accumulate any wealth. But as a general proposition RWP's are BY FAR our wealthiest demographic group.
They fret about being forced by the tax laws to take money out of their IRA's and 401k's - they don't need any more money to live on, of course - because it will result in possibly having to pay a few dollars in taxes. Copious doctor bills that would choke a horse are passed on to EVERYONE ELSE through Medicare, when these folks have hundreds of thousands of dollars (or much more than that) sitting in accounts, and could easily afford to PAY THEIR OWN FUCKING DOCTOR BILLS. And they would be doing so, in a sane world.
But no, our government plows along with trillion dollar annual deficits, mainly generated by the vast financial obligations of Social Security and Medicare, which mainly benefit people who have little actual need for them.
Again, SOCIAL SECURITY IS NO TRUST FUND. It is a tax, and on the other side, it is an ENTITLEMENT - just like WELFARE. People who NEED IT should get it, but people who are living as described above - and there are tens of millions of us - should be getting a minimal stipend - a couple hundred bucks a month, and the total Medicare outlay for any individual with a million-dollar retirement nest egg should be capped at some sane amount. There is no "Constitutional" right to have OTHER PEOPLE pay your final medical bills so that you can pass along some money to your spoiled Baby Boomer kids. Twenty-five percent of all medical spending in this country is spent on old bastards in the last 90 days of their lives, usually just prolonging the inevitable, and ONLY BECAUSE the Medical Establishment knows there is no cap on such wasteful spending.
The Third Rail of American politics? You bet it is, but there are very few other areas of government that so accurately define what vote-whores our elected officials are. There is a clear path to what is RIGHT and FAIR, but none of them...NONE OF THEM...has the balls to even hint at rationalizing this system that is bankrupting the Government. Thank God I'll be dead by the time the whole thing collapses. Nyuk, nyuk, yuk.
Retired White People are, on average, rolling in money, but they revel in lavish financial benefits paid for by everyone else. They own their own homes outright, they have zero or near-zero debt, they have seven-figure IRA's, plus other investments in stocks, bonds, real estate, and grandiose personal possessions like boats, expensive cars, timeshares in tropical resorts, jewelry and furs. Spend some time in Florida this time of year and it will turn your stomach. Trendy restaurants surrounded by expensive European, American, and Japanese luxury cars, while their owners - gray-hairs all - sit and get themselves plastered while stuffing themselves on hundred-dollar dinners. Million-dollar condo's by the thousands, all occupied - part time, if you please - by mainly-northern Retired White People. One cannot even imagine what their Real Home looks like back in New Jersey. Go on a cruise sometime. RWP's populate all of them, many doing several 5-figure cruises a year - they have nothing else to do.
Not all RWP's are rich, of course. Many were working class, supported families, put their kids through college at great personal sacrifice, or just didn't manage to accumulate any wealth. But as a general proposition RWP's are BY FAR our wealthiest demographic group.
They fret about being forced by the tax laws to take money out of their IRA's and 401k's - they don't need any more money to live on, of course - because it will result in possibly having to pay a few dollars in taxes. Copious doctor bills that would choke a horse are passed on to EVERYONE ELSE through Medicare, when these folks have hundreds of thousands of dollars (or much more than that) sitting in accounts, and could easily afford to PAY THEIR OWN FUCKING DOCTOR BILLS. And they would be doing so, in a sane world.
But no, our government plows along with trillion dollar annual deficits, mainly generated by the vast financial obligations of Social Security and Medicare, which mainly benefit people who have little actual need for them.
Again, SOCIAL SECURITY IS NO TRUST FUND. It is a tax, and on the other side, it is an ENTITLEMENT - just like WELFARE. People who NEED IT should get it, but people who are living as described above - and there are tens of millions of us - should be getting a minimal stipend - a couple hundred bucks a month, and the total Medicare outlay for any individual with a million-dollar retirement nest egg should be capped at some sane amount. There is no "Constitutional" right to have OTHER PEOPLE pay your final medical bills so that you can pass along some money to your spoiled Baby Boomer kids. Twenty-five percent of all medical spending in this country is spent on old bastards in the last 90 days of their lives, usually just prolonging the inevitable, and ONLY BECAUSE the Medical Establishment knows there is no cap on such wasteful spending.
The Third Rail of American politics? You bet it is, but there are very few other areas of government that so accurately define what vote-whores our elected officials are. There is a clear path to what is RIGHT and FAIR, but none of them...NONE OF THEM...has the balls to even hint at rationalizing this system that is bankrupting the Government. Thank God I'll be dead by the time the whole thing collapses. Nyuk, nyuk, yuk.
