In Defense of Social Security

Democracy Forums ^ | August 12, 2011 | Truth

[rabscuttle385]

They played by the rules

That's the problem.

This Ponzi scheme should have been destroyed a long time ago.

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t think many people think of Social Security to be a very suitable retirement in the overall scheme of things. They more or less tolerated it not counting on it being the be all end all when they retired.

I’ve know the Social Security system was a fraud from the later years of high school, over 40 years ago.

Our leaders knew it, both Republican and Democrat. Everyone said they understood the government plan was severely flawed. Another-words they agreed with us saying so every few years along the way.

Here’s your chance. We’ll see how effectively you get things changed.

Perhaps you will get it changed, but my take is that the replacement will be every bit as big an inadequate fraud as this current system is.

[arderkrag]

I’ve been paying in since high school. I don’t want to see a dime of it back or have to pay any more into it. And quite with the “care for the elderly” angle - they should have put something aside before then or they can try to survive on charity.

[TruConservative]

Well, I guess I’m the only person who who thinks this, but I’ll respond just to prove that I read responses and consider them. I can take it.

SS is not capitalism, nor socialism; it is not a Ponzi scheme; it does not depend on investment or savings. It is an uniquely American solution born out of our historic tradition of neighbors helping neighbors. It is in the tradition of American homesteading and barn-building and great projects that made us a great nation. It is that everyone with a paycheck puts money into a pot; and everyone post-working life gets to draw money out of that pot.

The nearest analogy I can come up with is that it is like a group of people at your work getting together to buy lotto tickets. The more people who join in, the greater the odds of wining, but the smaller the personal take. Only in SS, it is everyone (who has a job) in the country joining in, the odds of wining are 100%, and the take is very modest.

I think the biggest valid complaint is that it is mandatory - but it is not! (No, I don’t mean that you don’t have to have a job if you don’t want to.) It is a program created by politicians elected by us. If you really want to end SS, you can end it like we ended prohibition. We have the constitutionally-provided ability to end SS if enough voters agree. In the meantime, it is no different than all the other laws we abide by. Yes, it is a limit on our freedom that we can’t walk naked down the street, can’t swear whole-heartedly in a public place, and have to have a license to drive a car, have to contribute to SS, and a host of other agreed upon things that we are stuck with until we the voters change it.

But it’s not a bad deal!!! It is not as good as investment with perfect hindsight, but it turns out to have been a lot better than buying stock in Enron or Lehrman brothers! And it solves the problem of devastating retirement poverty that existed in 1935 so completely that we’ve forgotten all about that problem. Now that’s a successful program - one whose success has been so complete that we forget the reason for it.

[arderkrag]

And it solves the problem of devastating retirement poverty that existed in 1935 so completely that we’ve forgotten all about that problem.

They should have relied on voluntary community charity. You should never be taxed for charity's sake - it makes the charity meaningless. And yes, SS IS socialist, through and through. You are taxing people to help others. That's socialism in action.