Posted on 10/23/2003 3:32:08 PM PDT by Brian S
Immigration and Life Expectancies Should Change Social Security Projections, Panel Says
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON Oct. 23 — The government should change how it projects Social Security's future finances by assuming significant increases in immigration, longer life expectancies and lower inflation, an advisory panel said Thursday.
If adopted, the system's projected 75-year deficit would rise by $200 billion to $3.7 trillion, according to a report by a panel of economists, actuaries and demographers appointed to review methods now used to project Social Security's future financial status.
Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system, in which workers' payroll taxes fund benefits for current retirees. The system faces financial problems as the large baby boom generation starts retiring in five years, while there are fewer workers to pay Social Security taxes.
The most urgent change would be to assume an increase in immigration rather than a decline, the report said.
"Given the steady increase in immigration experienced since World War II, the panel believes that the current assumption of a decline in the annual number of immigrants is unrealistic," it said.
Immigration has increased by an average of about 4 percent a year since 1950. Yet Social Security trustees assume a drop this year from 1.2 million to an annual total of 900,000 in 2023 and after, the report said.
"In light of the sustained, rapid increase of net migration over more than five decades, the panel finds this assumption to be highly implausible," the report said. "Since immigration results in a larger and younger population, the effect of a mistaken migration assumption on projected trust fund balances should be a major cause of concern."
The panel also recommended that assumptions for mortality rates be changed to result in a projected life expectancy of 84.4 years instead of the current 82.9 years for someone born in 2070.
On labor force participation, Social Security trustees should eliminate an assumption recently added that rates will rise because of increases in life expectancy. The report said sufficient evidence does not yet exist that points to a sustained trend of Americans working longer and postponing retirement.
Other recommendations include an increase in the assumed rate of real wage growth and a decrease in the assumed rate of inflation.
The Social Security Technical Panel on Assumptions and Methods was appointed by the Social Security Advisory Board, an independent, bipartisan board created in 1994 to advise the president, Congress and the Social Security commissioner.
On the Net:
Social Security Advisory Board:
In the meantime, our living standard, education level will substantially decline and we will forget that it is unbeneficial to breed like rabbits. We won't need 3rd world immigrants---we'll start making our own!!!
And you guys thought we wouldn't be producing anything in the future!?
Well, yes--I'm afraid that the best our leaders can do.
Besides, with the extra money those new immigrants will put into SS--just think of all the other things aside from retirements our leaders can spend it on.
Both major political parties perpetuate The Big Lie regarding Social Security. The Big Lie has existed since Social Security's inception. The debate over "privatization" is only the latest version of The Big Lie.
The Big Lie is that Social Security is some kind of retirement savings plan.
It is NOT.
Social Security is a socialist income redistribution scheme, nothing else.
Those who are working are taxed to provide a "safety net" for those who are less fortunate.
Originally, this meant retirees and surviving dependents.
Congress has, of course, complicated it far beyond this over the last 65 years.
But one fact remains: it is NOT a "savings plan", it is an income redistribution scheme.
A major facet of The Big Lie is that "we have to do something so that Social Security remains solvent in the future.
Poppycock!
In today's age of modern computerization, the computation for operating an income redistribution scheme that remains perpetually solvent is quite simple:
The only change necessary to the current system is that monthly payments to eligible recipients would be a variable amount, not fixed.
THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO NEED FOR A MULTI-TRILLION DOLLAR "TRUST" FUND!!!
Congress should NEVER have been permitted to confiscate so much money from the American People in the name of The Big Lie. This fund is nothing but a slush fund that Congress raids to pay for other government expenditures. If private sector employers did the same thing with their companies' pension funds, they'd be placed in prison. The "privatization" plan proposed by Bush is merely an attempt by Wall Street brokerage firms and financial institutions to get in on the scam: grab a portion of a constant revenue stream (guaranteed by taxation) from which they can skim their commissions.
Daschle's "concern" over the Social Security system is a lie.
Bush's plan to Enronize the system is worse.
The American People need to wake up and put these liars and thieves in prison.
Illegal immigration bankrupts Social Security in 29 years !!! The Feds should be tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail filled with rusty nails. ButtHeads!
It's my opinion that Social Security "went wrong" because it's flawed to begin with. Ponzi schemes Do Not Work.
I'm merely stating the obvious based on what we're stuck with. One of the real downsides to the market crash of late is that it completely stripped all momentum from the privatization of SSI. With the level of corruption on Wallstreet going on and continuing to do so, that it lost momentum is a good thing. Once some integrity returns to the markets it will be time to give it another shot.
The government usually FUBARizes everything it touches and their bookkeeping schemes are just as bad, if not worse, than most corporations.
I'm not gonna live long enough to see S.S. ended, but I still keep on dreamin' about it.
Who you talkin' to, Vicente or Jorge?
Vote buying whores we call politicians do not have the grit for the first option and certainly not the long term resolve for the second.
"I'll choose civil war in 2020 Alex for $500". It's what I anticipate.
Heck, I'm ready now. Let the games begin!
What does the life expectancy of someone born in 2070 have to do with a projection of the deficit for the next 75 years?
And Vicente is demanding that whatever Mexicans are left in Mexico get in on our Social Security program. He figures he can buy votes with American taxpayer dollars that way.
If they're working off the books they're not paying anything into Soc Sec, but they may be eligible for SSI.
On that note, I bid you goodnight, Fitz. It's time for my annual viewing of Blazing Saddles.
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