Social Security is Not a Ponzi Scheme, Mr. Perry

[OohPooPahDoo]

For the SS is not a Ponzi scheme crowd.



Social Security is Not a Ponzi Scheme, Mr. Perry - Hit & Run : Reason Magazine

If Social Security is a Ponzi scheme then so is any insurance product.

So, you don't know diddly dog about the operation of Insurance Companies, eh oompahdufus?

I know they don't take your premiums and squirrel it away for you in your own private lockbox.

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

No it doesn't. The minute an insurance company opens its doors, it's legally required to have enough assets to pay off all potential claims.

It is not. They can pass off some of the risk with reinsurance.

Which, by definition, MEANS that they DO have the assets to pay of all potential claims, moron.

A insurance policy doesn't show up as an asset on the balance sheet and its backed by the insurance companies promise to pay.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Social security is the greatest thing America does for America, to deny that is have no heart and no soul. It helps many who through death, accident, or sickness need help. The heartless republicans only think of the rich, as the rich is where they are, or where they want to be. Empathy is missing from their soul. http://www.usmessageboard.com/healt...lthcare/181931-conservatives-and-empathy.html

And SS runs well - minus the morons in congress who haven't a friggin clue what they are talking about.

"For 45 years, the defense-industry analyst paid into the system until his retirement in 1994. But with all the recent hoopla over reform, Mr. Logue, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate, decided to go back and check his own records. Would he have done better investing his money than the bureaucrats at the Social Security Administration?

He recorded all the payroll taxes he paid into the system (including the matching amount from his employer), tracked down the return the Social Security Trust Fund earned for each of the 45 years, and then compared the result with what he would have gotten had he been able to invest the same amount of payroll tax money over the same period in the Dow Jones Industrial Average (including dividends).

To his surprise, the Social Security investment won out: $261,372 versus $255,499, a difference of $5,873." One man's retirement math: Social Security wins / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com

-

Just because it is great for the people that benefit does not mean it is not a Ponzu scheme. If being great for people was all that mattered Bernie Madoff would have got a government bailout.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Why Social Security is Not a Ponzi Scheme

How about that, CNN agrees with me.

Nice to know.

 

[saveliberty]

It is not. They can pass off some of the risk with reinsurance.

Which, by definition, MEANS that they DO have the assets to pay of all potential claims, moron.

A insurance policy doesn't show up as an asset on the balance sheet and its backed by the insurance companies promise to pay.

No a potential payout would be a liability dumbass.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

GOPers may intend on defrauding the elderly,which fits the GOP MO bit Democrats plan on meeting their obligations.

The may plan on it....but it rarely materializes.

Just remember....intentions are more valuable then results.

Social Security has not added one dime to the national debt and has a trillion plus dollar surplus and is solvent to 2037.

You should do some more truth seeking. Every time the SS trust fund buys a T-bill it adds to the national debt. Everyone understands this, including Obama. Why do you think he threatened not to send out SS checks if we did not raise the debt ceiling?

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

The bank loans the money to people who have to pay it back.

They don't necessarily have to. They might not be able to. Take a look around.
In that case, your account is backed by the FDIC - which has its funds in GUESS WHAT? (three guesses - hint, it starts with a T)

It doesn't loan the money to itself. Your analogies don't compare to what the so-called "trust fund" is.

I never said it loaned the money to itself. You've loaned your money to the bank. They are the ones obligated by contract to pay you - not the folks the bank has loaned their money out to. Your deposit is backed only by the ability of the bank to pay it, its nothing more than a piece of electronic paper from the bank that says what they owe you.

I knew you would say that. Banks sell the right to collect from you. No one sells your obligation to pay the bank. You can't even keep the two ends of the deal straight.

Its possible in some cases for a buyer to assume the mortgage of the seller - so yeah, actually, you can sell your obligation to pay the bank (if the house comes with it).

"Underfunded" means they didn't have enough marketable assets in them. It's against the law.

it is not. Companies have underfunded pensions all the time. It happens when the economy tanks.

Largest U.S. pension plans' assets fall $217 billion short - USATODAY.com

"Setting aside the beneficiary's salary" means investing it in marketable assets, such as stock and bonds.

They set it aside but they may still NOT HAVE ENOUGH TO PAY THE OBLIGATION! Can you comprehend how a company might figure it will need to set aside X dollars for you to live in retirement with Y salary - and get it wrong, and not have enough? Its a calculation based not only on how long you will live but on expected returns in the market, can you comprehend how that could be hard to predict?

No they didn't. They offered free stock in their 401K plan, which is not a defined benefit plan. Companies are allowed to give employees company stock, which is all Enron did. Those employees got burned when the company filed for bankruptcy.

And you can't have enough money to cover all potential claims due on a defined benefit plan. If you save it in debt obligations from others - those debts might fail (be they bank deposits or corporate bonds). If you save it as currency - it pays no interest - thus cannot accommodate arbitrarily long retirements.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Social Security is a Ponzi scheme!!! was the Right's lament back in 1983 too.

Then Reagan AND the Democrats fixed it.

Ponzi ponzi ponzi is nothing more than baseless rightwing fearmongering.

I have a question..

Why did they need to fix it if it wasn't a Ponzi scheme?

By the way, increasing the SS tax was not a fix, it just kicked the problem down the road a while by forcing people to have a higher buy in to keep paying the old investors. Ponzi schemes do that all the time.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Dick Cheney stated that of course SS is not a ponzi scheme in reponse to Perry's inane comments.

You want to isolate the center from the GOP in this election, guys?

Continue with this argument and the GOP will lose across the board.

When did Cheney become the center of the Republican party? I thought you hated him. Do you only hate people until you find something you can use to prove you are a statist?

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

If Social Security is a Ponzi scheme then so is any insurance product.

Many overlook the fact that Social Security is insurance.

Actually, it isn't.

Insurance is a pool that people pay into in case they need help. Social Security is a fund people pay in for when they retire. The first is obviously not going to pay out to everyone, the second is actually designed to pay out to everyone.

Calling it insurance just proves you do not know what insurance is, which probably explains why politicians call it insurance.

Its called Old Age and Survivors Insurance.

An ANNUITY is also an insurance product that people use to retire. But its not a retirement FUND.

Like all insurance - whether or not you get more out of it than you pay into it depends a lot on chance and luck.

The difference is simple. A retirement fund is an account you have in your name and it has in it what you (or others) have put in it plus earnings and gains.

Old age insurance is an insurance policy. Like an annuity - it represents an obligation to pay X amount of dollars over Y time period - regardless of the assets that may back it.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

For the SS is not a Ponzi scheme crowd.

One, a Ponzi scheme collects money from new investors and uses it to pay previous investors—minus a fee. But Social Security collects money from new investors, uses some of it to pay previous investors, and spends the surplus on programs for politically favored groups—minus the cost of supporting a massive bureaucracy. Over the years, trillions of dollars have been spent on these groups and bureaucrats. Two, participation in Ponzi schemes is voluntary. Not so with Social Security. The government automatically withholds payroll taxes and “invests” them for you.
Three: When a Ponzi scheme can’t con new investors in sufficient numbers to pay the previous investors, it collapses. But when Social Security runs low on investors—also called poor working stiffs—it raises taxes.

Social Security is Not a Ponzi Scheme, Mr. Perry - Hit & Run : Reason Magazine

I'm sorry, are you making a case FOR Social Security? Because after reading your post, it sound WORSE than a Ponzi scheme.

It is.

Ponzi schemes only get idiots. SS gets everyone.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

If they "fixed it," then why is it still broken? Mulcting the suckers for more cash doesn't fix a Ponzi scheme. You never fix it. You only make it bigger and screw people even worse than they have already been screwed.

It isn't. Its never missed a payment.

They reneged on the terms of the deal. It's bankrupt. Bernie Madoff also never missed a payment.

Until he did.

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

The only problem today with social security today is the US government. Working people have paid into this program all of their working careers. The government has squandered this money away on everything except for what it was intended for.

That's not even true. The money was spent paying beneficiaries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. When you pay your FICA tax its used to pay current beneficiaries. If there's any left over, they put it in the trust fund, if they're short a little bit, they take some out the trust fund, but on average its pay-as-you-go.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

SS is not a ponzi scheme and bripat knows not of what he writes.

Ponzi scheme - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to separate investors, not from any actual profit earned by the organization, but from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors. The Ponzi scheme usually entices new investors by offering returns other investments cannot guarantee, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent. The perpetuation of the returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises and pays requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors to keep the scheme going.

The system is destined to collapse because the earnings, if any, are less than the payments to investors."

Are you sure he got it wrong?

sounds VERY similar to Social Security to me.

clevergirl's concern is addressed here. The money is more than sufficient if the Congress would keep its hands off of it, Dem and Pub congresses alike. Leave the funding alone, and the ship will right itself.

Strange.

The government claims that, under the assumption that all the money in the SS trust fund is in a lock box somewhere, it will be bankrupt by 2017 if Congress does not apply the same "fix" they did in 1994. Even if they do fix it, it will be totally out of funds by 2036. You must have a different definition of sufficient funds than I do.

Social Security disability on verge of insolvency - Yahoo! News

 

[JakeStarkey]

The only problem today with social security today is the US government. Working people have paid into this program all of their working careers. The government has squandered this money away on everything except for what it was intended for.

That's not even true. The money was spent paying beneficiaries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. When you pay your FICA tax its used to pay current beneficiaries. If there's any left over, they put it in the trust fund, if they're short a little bit, they take some out the trust fund, but on average its pay-as-you-go.

Not quite so. Since 1968, SS can be used to pay other government programs.

 

[flacaltenn]

The only problem today with social security today is the US government. Working people have paid into this program all of their working careers. The government has squandered this money away on everything except for what it was intended for.

That's not even true. The money was spent paying beneficiaries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. When you pay your FICA tax its used to pay current beneficiaries. If there's any left over, they put it in the trust fund, if they're short a little bit, they take some out the trust fund, but on average its pay-as-you-go.

How dense are you really OPiDoo? Are we talking LEAD dense?

BBDog was talking about the $3Trill SURPLUS that Soc Sec had run until 2010. ALL of the Surplus was STOLEN and you were given some fairy tale about a "trust fund". He was EXACTLY correct in his statement above. They've never paid a dollar to a recipient "from the trust fund". They are just NOW covering overages in liabilities by issuing NEW DEBT. They've issued that NEW debt BECAUSE of a promise and a handshake..

What the F9o753K will it take? You need links? Did you need a LOBOTOMY? Do you need glasses? Just tell what it would take for you to become RATIONAL on this topic??

I've had it with this repeated assertion that everything is all cozy and warm with Soc Sec. Every near-sighted one of you..

 

[clevergirl]

The only problem today with social security today is the US government. Working people have paid into this program all of their working careers. The government has squandered this money away on everything except for what it was intended for.

That's not even true. The money was spent paying beneficiaries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. When you pay your FICA tax its used to pay current beneficiaries. If there's any left over, they put it in the trust fund, if they're short a little bit, they take some out the trust fund, but on average its pay-as-you-go.

SS was a “pay-as-you-go” system, where current tax collections paid for current benefits. The SS trust fund idea gave us the illusion that we were advance funding SS benefits, in a manner similar to the private pension system. In reality, though, SS is still pay-as-you-go, with the difference being that future generations will pay for both the benefits outlay and the repayment of principal and interest on the special government bonds in the trust fund.

Again, there is NO FUND- though it has become normal nomenclature to refer to it as such~ There are T-bills which are used for different kinds of government liabilities, not only SS. T-bills are both a liability and an asset, since they are part of the total federal debt. Basically, one hand of the government owes the other hand, and the investments in the so called “trust fund” are not separate from the entity that sponsors it.

 

[Zona]

I guess Perry really does not like that pesky older voter group.....good luck with that Perry.

Moron.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Many overlook the fact that Social Security is insurance.

Actually, it isn't.

Insurance is a pool that people pay into in case they need help. Social Security is a fund people pay in for when they retire. The first is obviously not going to pay out to everyone, the second is actually designed to pay out to everyone.

Calling it insurance just proves you do not know what insurance is, which probably explains why politicians call it insurance.

Its called Old Age and Survivors Insurance.

An ANNUITY is also an insurance product that people use to retire. But its not a retirement FUND.

Like all insurance - whether or not you get more out of it than you pay into it depends a lot on chance and luck.

The difference is simple. A retirement fund is an account you have in your name and it has in it what you (or others) have put in it plus earnings and gains.

Old age insurance is an insurance policy. Like an annuity - it represents an obligation to pay X amount of dollars over Y time period - regardless of the assets that may back it.

The government calls the newest attempt to reform patents the Patent Reform Act, even though it doesn't reform patents. Why should a law that called SS insurance when it passed decades ago be any more accurate?

FYI, insurance is the transfer of risk from one party to anther in exchange for payment. The government assumes no risk in Social Security, and I transfer no risk to it when I pay my taxes. That means SS is not insurance, no matter what the government, or the politicians that decide what to call things, says.

 

[flacaltenn]

The only problem today with social security today is the US government. Working people have paid into this program all of their working careers. The government has squandered this money away on everything except for what it was intended for.

That's not even true. The money was spent paying beneficiaries. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program. When you pay your FICA tax its used to pay current beneficiaries. If there's any left over, they put it in the trust fund, if they're short a little bit, they take some out the trust fund, but on average its pay-as-you-go.

SS was a “pay-as-you-go” system, where current tax collections paid for current benefits. The SS trust fund idea gave us the illusion that we were advance funding SS benefits, in a manner similar to the private pension system. In reality, though, SS is still pay-as-you-go, with the difference being that future generations will pay for both the benefits outlay and the repayment of principal and interest on the special government bonds in the trust fund.

Again, there is NO FUND- though it has become normal nomenclature to refer to it as such~ There are T-bills which are used for different kinds of government liabilities, not only SS. T-bills are both a liability and an asset, since they are part of the total federal debt. Basically, one hand of the government owes the other hand, and the investments in the so called “trust fund” are not separate from the entity that sponsors it.

Slight correction -- There are no "T-Bills" in the Trust fund. I've posted the SSA.GOV statement to fact many times.. Lord knows what's actually in there. People have seen the paper -- but it's NOT NEGOTIABLE and it's NOT TRANSFERABLE..

Pardon my shouting -- I'm pissed at others. -- Not you...