I don’t get the 401k scare. Granted, government will confiscate if the mood strikes. But they’ll take anything because they’re sluts. Why are we so particularly defensively about 401ks, anyway, when they started openly and deliberately stealing retirement for our own good over 70 years ago? It’s as if they banned fruit, then legalized apples, and now we’re frightened they’ll take away our apples. What about the rest of the fruit? Should’ve held the line for it all instead of apples alone.
Besides, if they can’t get 401k money directly they’ll inflate it into their coffers.
I just wish I would have spent it on hookers and booze instead of saving it all those years.
Well, we all knew that Social Security had problems. A little history on how this all transpired:
As designed, it intentionally required a bunch of workers to pay a (premium) for Insurance(Old Age Survivors and Disability Insurance-OASDI)for the elderly who were not able to work or find a job during the Great Depression.
It was not a retirement system as much as it was insurance in case you couldn’t work. The insurance companies didn’t want to mess with the little individual policies for your average Joe anymore, they wanted to concentrate on more well to do clients.
A Republican Insurance Guy helped develop the original proposal. The Democrats fought it, cause the Union didn’t like it. The Railroad had a similar plan that went through Congress, and wound up at the Supreme Court. Congress has no authority to levy premiums, but they can tax. A few changes, and wahla it is all constitutional.
Had this Insurance continued as a private plan, the Insurance Actuaries would have determined for the industry changes that needed to be made to be viable: such as retirement age, premium adjustments, etc and changes would have been implemented as it went along. Congress didn’t make all these adjustments.
Fast Forward to the Reagan Era. So Reagan and Tip O’neil agreed that in order to “fix” it, the baby boomers would have to continue supporting those who were currently receiving checks, but would also need to contribute more in order to support their own “retirement” which was to be delayed by a few years.
Baby boomers were okay with that, but a bit skeptical that they would ever see a penny of that money. The IRAs seemed like a good way to reduce your taxes and help save for a scenario where the Social Security system was insolvent. then along came the 401k and company matching.
I prefer managing my own IRA/401k plan rather than Social Security. The privitization of Social Security was discussed during the Clinton years, but never really took off.
Just think, if all that money could have been invested during the 1990’s, most people would be better off today.
Any way, the government is not getting my IRA or 401K. I’ll take it and invest it in land, ammo, or food etc. As inflation heats up, you can sell the extra items to buy what you need or to pay taxes.
They will take the fund electronically, just like Aegentina did over 2 1/2 years ago. They hid behind “We have to pay off the country’s debt & everyone has to help”.
The didn’t touch UNION pensions or Public Employee pensions—only private money. Sooo- ‘everyone’ did NOT help-—only a portion of Argentina ‘helped’-—and got heavily burned in the process.
Now, 2 1/2 years later, after $69 BILLION was stolen there, Argentina is knocking on the door of bankruptcy again—and there is no more fund of private money to steal.
Some estimates are that there is $13-15 TRILLION in PRIVATE pensions & IRA’s, etc. That would put a huge dent in the USA debt payoff, but Obama will never pay back our loans. He will only spend more money- and a great deal of it will be spent on his private army so he can continue as King of the USA until he dies & then he will expect Michelle to take over-—also like Argentina has done. A husband & wife down there concocted a plan to have them each serve 2 consecutive terms, and then hand everything over to the other. Their laws say ‘2 CONSECUTIVE’ terms—not ‘2 TERMS—NO MORE, PERIOD’.
Husband did 2 terms. Wife got next 2 terms. So, after 4 terms in the same marriage, the stage was set for the Husband to take over again for another 2 terms in 2013.
OOOOPSS—he died in 2010, so the wife is trying to change the Argentina laws again to benefit her, so she can ‘stay Presidente’ forever.
Moving all this money into the Federal coffers will collapse the banks—Wall Street—Money Markets—everything.
I predict that the DOW will fall below 2000—if not more.
Such a collapse will trigger other countries to also teeter—and NO country will ever loan monty to the USA again.
This isn’t a threat—it is a fact.
Obama will take this country below the status of any country you can choose in Africa—which was his entire plan all along. He is ‘leveling the playing field’-—to the stanards of Somalia or Zimbabwe.
The media will not be exempt from trouble, either. They will run out of places to hide.
All those on Federal handout recipients will find their benefits will stop in the same blink of an electronic eye. Feral behavior will surface in about 15 minutes.
Lock and load—and keep your weapons handy.
This is all another reason why Obama wants to take all our guns.
Obama is on the path of a scorched earth policy—and Dirty Harry is willing to light the match and Pelosi is willing to pour on more fuel.