Social Security: It's worse than you think

So, what if the U.S. can't pay back the debt owed SS... ever consider that? WTF is $2T of IOU's actually worth if the guarantor is already $16T in debt and climbing?

Use your head for once.

The US doesn't have to pay the 3 trillion back. That is one of the big myths on this subject. the trust fund is invested money, like you would invest your retirement funds. you live off the interest generated you don't draw down the principal. that's why SS only needs to be adjusted,

to at least keep annual outflow equal to or less than incoming payroll taxes plus earned interest.

That only works if you don't understand math.


My MATH in the above statement says that Social Security only needs to be adjusted to keep outflows at or below the level of income.

NOW, you tell me what is wrong with that math?
 
Nothing is wrong with the math, NYC. The issue for the right, of course, is the idea of the government mandating old age retirement insurance.
 
The Trust Fund has been growing since 1983 when the last major SS reform took place.

How can the Trust Fund be growing if SS is going broke?

Because it stopped growing. It has been paying out more than it has taken in the last two years, do you live under a rock?

That's not true.

Social Security’s expenditures exceeded non-interest income in 2010 and 2011, the first such occurrences since 1983, and the Trustees estimate that these expenditures will remain greater than non-interest income throughout the 75-year projection period. The deficit of non-interest income relative to expenditures was about $49 billion in 2010 and $45 billion in 2011, and the Trustees project that it will average about $66 billion between 2012 and 2018 before rising steeply as the economy slows after the recovery is complete and the number of beneficiaries continues to grow at a substantially faster rate than the number of covered workers. Redemption of trust fund assets from the General Fund of the Treasury will provide the resources needed to offset the annual cash-flow deficits. Since these redemptions will be less than interest earnings through 2020, nominal trust fund balances will continue to grow.

If you need me to explain to you why the highlighted line proves you don't know what you're talking about, by all means ask.

Trustees Report Summary

Expenditures exceeded interest income and Obama responded by eliminating the payroll tax that is the primary funding method for the Social Security trust fund.

From your link.

Lawmakers should not delay addressing the long-run financial challenges facing Social Security and Medicare. If they take action sooner rather than later, more options and more time will be available to phase in changes so that the public has adequate time to prepare. Earlier action will also help elected officials minimize adverse impacts on vulnerable populations, including lower-income workers and people already dependent on program benefits.

You can blather all day long about how we don't have a problem, but doing so means ignoring the facts, and the math that supports those facts.
 
There's no need to be an asshole with every post you make. We get it. You're an asshole.

Now tell me what is wrong with the math specifically.

You made those absurd statements seriously?

What math did you use to come to your conclusion? Just asking, because all I saw were stupid staements that ignored both reality and math.

You would have been better off asking what assumptions you are making that are so stupid they don't deserve to be called assumptions.

First things first, what makes you think that the government does not have to repay loans to social Security? Are you operating on the assumption that the principle will never have to be repaid simply because you didn't bother to read the report in the OP? It used the numbers published by the government to support its position, yet you insist that the numbers that the you pulled out of thin air prove you are the one that is right. Tell me something, why should I be forced to prove your math is wrong when you not only do not use math, you make up facts out of whole cloth?

You should prove my math wrong because you're the one who claimed I don't know the math and you do.

I did not claim your math was bad, I said you don't understand math. I can't actually refute something you do not use, can I?
 
The US doesn't have to pay the 3 trillion back. That is one of the big myths on this subject. the trust fund is invested money, like you would invest your retirement funds. you live off the interest generated you don't draw down the principal. that's why SS only needs to be adjusted,

to at least keep annual outflow equal to or less than incoming payroll taxes plus earned interest.

That only works if you don't understand math.


My MATH in the above statement says that Social Security only needs to be adjusted to keep outflows at or below the level of income.

NOW, you tell me what is wrong with that math?

The math tells us that the only way to make those adjustments is to make small changes in how it is paid out by 2000. Since that did not happen, and cannot happen, the only way to keep expenditures below the level of expected income is to make radical changes by last year. Once again, that is clearly impossible, so we have to do something drastic now. Once again, that is highly unlikely, which leaves us with the math telling us that the longer we put off the needed changes the more drastic those changes are going to have to be.

You even linked to the Trustee report that said exactly what I am explaining, yet you still insist that the math supports minor changes that can wait until 2033.
 
QWB is making assertions without any proof whatsoever. The fact of the matter, since I can do it as well and more correct in my point, is that minor changes in income tops and means testing will resolve the issue.

I suspect that QWB is unhappy because of his political positions on government spending and what government spends on.
 
QWB is making assertions without any proof whatsoever. The fact of the matter, since I can do it as well and more correct in my point, is that minor changes in income tops and means testing will resolve the issue.

I suspect that QWB is unhappy because of his political positions on government spending and what government spends on.

Jake is not reading the linked articles and postulating that he knows more than anyone else on the planet as a result.

All you have to do is use math to prove the numbers from the OP wrong, it should be easy for someone as smart as you are.
 
QWB is making assertions without any proof whatsoever. The fact of the matter, since I can do it as well and more correct in my point, is that minor changes in income tops and means testing will resolve the issue.

I suspect that QWB is unhappy because of his political positions on government spending and what government spends on.

Jake is not reading the linked articles and postulating that he knows more than anyone else on the planet as a result.

All you have to do is use math to prove the numbers from the OP wrong, it should be easy for someone as smart as you are.

QWB knows as well as I that if income tops are raised by $75000 per taxpayer and means testing is implemented, the problem disappears immediately.

The real problem, and I hop QWB will agree, is that Congress takes SS taxes and uses them in the slush fund. End that along with smaller raises n taxable income and means testing, then the issue no longer exists.

QWB, question for you: do you support the premise of government mandated SS. Yes or No will suffice.
 
I knew it was bad, but it turns out that the numbers I have been looking at depend on an erroneous assumption about life expectancy. It seems they expect everyone my age to be dead by 2028.

CONGRESS and President Obama have pushed through a relatively modest stopgap measure to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” but over the coming years, the United States will confront another huge cliff: Social Security. In the first presidential debate, Mr. Obama described Social Security as “structurally sound,” and Mitt Romney said that “neither the president nor I are proposing any changes” to the program. It was a rare issue on which both men agreed — and both were utterly wrong.
For the first time in more than a quarter-century, Social Security ran a deficit in 2010: It spent $49 billion dollars more in benefits than it received in revenues, and drew from its trust funds to cover the shortfall. Those funds — a $2.7 trillion buffer built in anticipation of retiring baby boomers — will be exhausted by 2033, the government currently projects.
Those facts are widely known. What’s not is that the Social Security Administration underestimates how long Americans will live and how much the trust funds will need to pay out — to the tune of $800 billion by 2031, more than the current annual defense budget — and that the trust funds will run out, if nothing is done, two years earlier than the government has predicted.
We reached these conclusions, and presented them in an article in the journal Demography, after finding that the government’s methods for forecasting Americans’ longevity were outdated and omitted crucial health and demographic factors. Historic declines in smoking and improvements in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease are adding years of life that the government hasn’t accounted for. (While obesity has rapidly increased, it is not likely, at this point, to offset these public health and medical successes.) More retirees will receive benefits for longer than predicted, supported by the payroll taxes of relatively fewer working adults than projected.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/opinion/sunday/social-security-its-worse-than-you-think.html?_r=1&

There are charts at this link.

Social Security?s Flawed Forecasting - Graphic - NYTimes.com



The solution is clear - we should give a ton of money to Wall Street.
 
I knew it was bad, but it turns out that the numbers I have been looking at depend on an erroneous assumption about life expectancy. It seems they expect everyone my age to be dead by 2028.

CONGRESS and President Obama have pushed through a relatively modest stopgap measure to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” but over the coming years, the United States will confront another huge cliff: Social Security. In the first presidential debate, Mr. Obama described Social Security as “structurally sound,” and Mitt Romney said that “neither the president nor I are proposing any changes” to the program. It was a rare issue on which both men agreed — and both were utterly wrong.
For the first time in more than a quarter-century, Social Security ran a deficit in 2010: It spent $49 billion dollars more in benefits than it received in revenues, and drew from its trust funds to cover the shortfall. Those funds — a $2.7 trillion buffer built in anticipation of retiring baby boomers — will be exhausted by 2033, the government currently projects.
Those facts are widely known. What’s not is that the Social Security Administration underestimates how long Americans will live and how much the trust funds will need to pay out — to the tune of $800 billion by 2031, more than the current annual defense budget — and that the trust funds will run out, if nothing is done, two years earlier than the government has predicted.
We reached these conclusions, and presented them in an article in the journal Demography, after finding that the government’s methods for forecasting Americans’ longevity were outdated and omitted crucial health and demographic factors. Historic declines in smoking and improvements in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease are adding years of life that the government hasn’t accounted for. (While obesity has rapidly increased, it is not likely, at this point, to offset these public health and medical successes.) More retirees will receive benefits for longer than predicted, supported by the payroll taxes of relatively fewer working adults than projected.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/opinion/sunday/social-security-its-worse-than-you-think.html?_r=1&

There are charts at this link.

Social Security?s Flawed Forecasting - Graphic - NYTimes.com



The solution is clear - we should give a ton of money to Wall Street.

Or cut taxes for the rich.
 
I knew it was bad, but it turns out that the numbers I have been looking at depend on an erroneous assumption about life expectancy. It seems they expect everyone my age to be dead by 2028.



http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/opinion/sunday/social-security-its-worse-than-you-think.html?_r=1&

There are charts at this link.

Social Security?s Flawed Forecasting - Graphic - NYTimes.com



The solution is clear - we should give a ton of money to Wall Street.

Or cut taxes for the rich.


And eliminate the minimum wage and cut funding for poor children.

That will ensure our nation's future
 
QWB is making assertions without any proof whatsoever. The fact of the matter, since I can do it as well and more correct in my point, is that minor changes in income tops and means testing will resolve the issue.

I suspect that QWB is unhappy because of his political positions on government spending and what government spends on.

Jake is not reading the linked articles and postulating that he knows more than anyone else on the planet as a result.

All you have to do is use math to prove the numbers from the OP wrong, it should be easy for someone as smart as you are.

QWB knows as well as I that if income tops are raised by $75000 per taxpayer and means testing is implemented, the problem disappears immediately.

The real problem, and I hop QWB will agree, is that Congress takes SS taxes and uses them in the slush fund. End that along with smaller raises n taxable income and means testing, then the issue no longer exists.

QWB, question for you: do you support the premise of government mandated SS. Yes or No will suffice.

Math, not sound bites.
 
Social Security still has a $2.7 trillion surplus and is good to around 2033 - even with no changes.

Plus, Social Security doesn't cost the government one penny - other than the interest paid on the government bonds held by Social Security - just like China and other holders of U.S. debt.

Social Security is the largest holder of U.S. debt - which is why NaziCons would like to fuck it over.

So, what if the U.S. can't pay back the debt owed SS... ever consider that? WTF is $2T of IOU's actually worth if the guarantor is already $16T in debt and climbing?

Use your head for once.

The US doesn't have to pay the 3 trillion back. That is one of the big myths on this subject. the trust fund is invested money, like you would invest your retirement funds. you live off the interest generated you don't draw down the principal. that's why SS only needs to be adjusted,

to at least keep annual outflow equal to or less than incoming payroll taxes plus earned interest.

How does one invest IOU's cause seriously, I wanna get in on some of that action.
 
Well perhaps after pot is legalized nationally life expectancy will decline as lung cancer prevails.

See, you need to begin to appreciate the silver lining of unintended consequences

Good News ~
Pot does Not cause cancer!! It has been shown to actually help stop lung cancer:tongue:


Marijuana Fights Cancer and Helps Manage Side Effects, Researchers Find - The Daily Beast

Marijuana Doesn't Increase Risk of Lung Cancer, Mental Illness or Death | 10 Reasons to Revisit Marijuana Policy Now | TIME.com
 
Well perhaps after pot is legalized nationally life expectancy will decline as lung cancer prevails.

See, you need to begin to appreciate the silver lining of unintended consequences

Good News ~
Pot does Not cause cancer!! It has been shown to actually help stop lung cancer:tongue:


Marijuana Fights Cancer and Helps Manage Side Effects, Researchers Find - The Daily Beast

Marijuana Doesn't Increase Risk of Lung Cancer, Mental Illness or Death | 10 Reasons to Revisit Marijuana Policy Now | TIME.com

Uhm, wrongo...

Does Smoking Marijuana Cause Lung Cancer
 
That only works if you don't understand math.


My MATH in the above statement says that Social Security only needs to be adjusted to keep outflows at or below the level of income.

NOW, you tell me what is wrong with that math?

The math tells us that the only way to make those adjustments is to make small changes in how it is paid out by 2000. Since that did not happen, and cannot happen, the only way to keep expenditures below the level of expected income is to make radical changes by last year. Once again, that is clearly impossible, so we have to do something drastic now. Once again, that is highly unlikely, which leaves us with the math telling us that the longer we put off the needed changes the more drastic those changes are going to have to be.

You even linked to the Trustee report that said exactly what I am explaining, yet you still insist that the math supports minor changes that can wait until 2033.

Social Security was within 1 year of insolvency in 1983 when it was reformed.

And don't lie about what the Trustee report says you dishonest twat.
 
You made those absurd statements seriously?

What math did you use to come to your conclusion? Just asking, because all I saw were stupid staements that ignored both reality and math.

You would have been better off asking what assumptions you are making that are so stupid they don't deserve to be called assumptions.

First things first, what makes you think that the government does not have to repay loans to social Security? Are you operating on the assumption that the principle will never have to be repaid simply because you didn't bother to read the report in the OP? It used the numbers published by the government to support its position, yet you insist that the numbers that the you pulled out of thin air prove you are the one that is right. Tell me something, why should I be forced to prove your math is wrong when you not only do not use math, you make up facts out of whole cloth?

You should prove my math wrong because you're the one who claimed I don't know the math and you do.

I did not claim your math was bad, I said you don't understand math. I can't actually refute something you do not use, can I?

Please stop being an asshole every time you lose an argument.
 

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