Posted on 04/28/2014 8:42:13 AM PDT by drypowder
It was also never supposed to exceed 1% of your income, ever be taxable, you were supposed to get back what you contributed...then the generation after you was supposed to pay for you, then now I guess two generations after you will pay for you with their hamburger jobs. Also, most of the existing fund has been invested in US Gov Bonds...so that is gone as well. Our politicians have effectively stolen the retirements from the Baby Boomers. Will they admit it? No way. By the way...the US Government only produces money through taxation...so they will have to go back and tax someone else to replace the missing money...Now you can see why both Democrats and Republicans favor Amnesty and Citizenship...they need more members of the Ponzi Scheme before it implodes.
Bookmarking
Wrong on all counts.
Also, most of the existing fund has been invested in US Gov Bonds...so that is gone as well.
All of the revenue is immediately converted into non-market, interest bearing T-bills and deposited into the SS Trust Fund, which currently holds $2.5 trillion in these T-bills.
Our politicians have effectively stolen the retirements from the Baby Boomers. Will they admit it? No way.
No money has been stolen. SS is unsustainable because of demographics and economics. There isn't sufficient revenue to pay the benefits promised. We need to either raise taxes or decrease benefits or some combination thereof. The current tax rate of 6.2% each for employee and employer was set in 1990 and has not been raised since.
Why should that be my problem?
If such a bill was ever offered, it was never passed. The SS Trust Fund pays all benefits.
MYTHS AND MISINFORMATION ABOUT SOCIAL SECURITY- Part 2
Q1. Which political party took Social Security from the independent trust fund and put it into the general fund so that Congress could spend it?
A1 There has never been any change in the way the Social Security program is financed or the way that Social Security payroll taxes are used by the federal government. The Social Security Trust Fund was created in 1939 as part of the Amendments enacted in that year. From its inception, the Trust Fund has always worked the same way. The Social Security Trust Fund has never been "put into the general fund of the government."
Most likely this question comes from a confusion between the financing of the Social Security program and the way the Social Security Trust Fund is treated in federal budget accounting. Starting in 1969 (due to action by the Johnson Administration in 1968) the transactions to the Trust Fund were included in what is known as the "unified budget." This means that every function of the federal government is included in a single budget. This is sometimes described by saying that the Social Security Trust Funds are "on-budget." This budget treatment of the Social Security Trust Fund continued until 1990 when the Trust Funds were again taken "off-budget." This means only that they are shown as a separate account in the federal budget. But whether the Trust Funds are "on-budget" or "off-budget" is primarily a question of accounting practices--it has no effect on the actual operations of the Trust Fund itself.
The only money that is taken out of the General Fund is when SSTF non-market, interest bearing T-bills are redeemed to make up shortfalls in revenue to pay benefits. SS has been running a deficit since 2010 and will continue to do so until it runs out of T-bills in 2033 and benefits will then be reduced in line with revenue--about 23%. Since we are running budget deficits in the General Fund, the USG is borrowing money to pay its debts, including redeeming SS T-bills.
The SSTF is included in our total $17.3 national debt and is held under "Intragovernmental Holdings" as distinct from the publicly held debt.
If you are a taxpayer, you may have to supplement their lack of income thru such programs as food stamps, Medicaid, etc.
If you are a taxpayer, you may have to supplement their lack of income thru such programs as food stamps, Medicaid, etc.
I don't worry about that because I have a lot of Bucks and worry about not spending what I got from my investments on things that I put off while accumulating those bucks
Why should I as a citizen, who trusted the Gov to exercise fiduciary responsibility with my money, to thrust me into groveler mode in my old age though their mismanagement?
In the case of SS, there is no such thing as an equivalent piece of paper. You need to look at the legislation that established SS. I invite your attention to Section 1104 of the original Social Security Act, never repealed: “The right to alter, amend, or repeal any provision of this Act is hereby reserved to the Congress.”
This routine reservation of power to amend legislation means Congress can cut benefits. And it has, several times, beginning with the removal of Social Security’s money-back guarantee in 1939. This necessarily demolishes the “earned right,” and with it any analogy to insurance, with its binding contractual obligations. For obvious reasons, this particular provision of Social Security, and its implications, were never publicized by Social Security’s partisans.
Congress can do whatever it wants with Social Security and the benefits paid. They raised the age of retirement for full benefits from 65 to 67 (signed by Reagan in 1983). When I started paying into SS in 1957, the age was 65. Nothing is engraved in stone. There is no contract with the USG and the individual when it comes to SS.
I don't worry about that because I have a lot of Bucks and worry about not spending what I got from my investments on things that I put off while accumulating those bucks
So don't worry. If we continue to spend ourselves into oblivion, your investments and lot of Bucks will be worth far less. Unless we have real entitlement reform, this Ship of Fools is going under the waves and you are a passenger.
Why should I as a citizen, who trusted the Gov to exercise fiduciary responsibility with my money, to thrust me into groveler mode in my old age though their mismanagement?
Your first and biggest mistake was trusting the federal government "to exercise fiduciary responsibility with my money." In just the entitlement programs alone, the government has made $100 trillion in promises it can't keep.
That is the reason I planned my retirement the way I did. As long as I get back what I put in, after that I will play the cars as delt.
You may or may not. A lot depends on how long you live, And if this country goes into economic chaos, then all bets are off. It may not be the Weimar Republic, but the dollar will not be worth that much if the Feds enforced low interest rates has the lid blown off and we enter into a period of hyperinflation.
Two more years.
Self ping
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