Posted on 03/05/2005 2:52:02 PM PST by CHARLITE
I am 54 years old, so I may be grandfathered into today's Social Security. Darn. Just return every penny I paid into it – and I keep what I contribute for the rest of my working life – and call it even. I won't ask for the interest. I know how much my employers and I put in. I figured out how long I must live to get that back, get it back with low interest, and when I start freeloading on younger workers. Change the law so I have what I paid into it – right now in a lump sum. I don't want socialism. I don't want old-age welfare. Even if I become poorer, I'll be freer, and it's better for my children.
C'mon, Congress, at least create alternatives for folks younger than me. Like:
Social Security A: Put your Social Security taxes into your personal savings account, like an IRA/401(k). Make money. Expect nothing from the government unless you go on welfare – called "welfare."
Social Security B: Put some of your taxes into a personal savings account. Expect reduced benefits from the government, but more money (personal savings + smaller Social Security = more money, no matter what).
Social Security C: Put your Social Security taxes in the gaping black hole of government and get reduced Social Security benefits.
Social Security D: Make The People pay to every citizen the retirement that Congress gets - screw the kids!
Here are 10 reasons to change Social Security, even if Congress rejects my four plans.
1. The 1930s Are Over. The socialist Band-Aid to get through the Great Depression is a tourniquet on our future. Let the seniors, who lived in the '30s and '40s, keep their antique. Promises made, promises kept.
2. Lower Benefits Are for Losers. Social Security will spend more money than it brings in by 2018. Lower benefits or raise taxes are the only options. Why should government force you to invest in a loser? Who aspires to be an impoverished Russian pensioner in America?
3. It's Going Bust Anyway. Raising taxes won't float the SS Social Security Titanic and save the Ponzi scheme. The immigration invasion alone may bring more demands on Social Security than illegal cheap labor can fund. No nation has ever taxed itself to prosperity – never.
4. It's One Economy, Stupid. So much of the economy is represented in the stock market that if the stock market fails, the economy fails. If the economy fails, the taxes fail. If the taxes fail, the government fails. The U.S. stock market, since 1790, beats inflation, recession, depression, war and disaster. Separating the economy from the government's money is a Marxist fantasy.
5. Any Investment Is Better. Social Security pays a 1.9 percent return. A person, age 20, who starts work at minimum wage and works minimum wage for their entire life – never gets a single promotion – can invest in government bonds alone and retire making more money than he ever made before.
6. I Can Manage My Money. Government is not my nanny. If we must have mandatory savings, at least let me choose where to invest. Regulations can require enough diversity to avoid an eggs-in-one-basket financial disaster.
7. My Family Gets Nothing. My parents paid max Social Security for all their lives. My dad died at 60 and got nothing. My mother retired after a stroke and every dollar she got from Social Security was deducted from Dad's survivor benefit retirement. If I die now, my kids get nothing – again. My savings should be mine, not the government's, to leave to my family. It's biblical.
8. Entitlements Are Socialist Theft. If everyone, including foreigners who move here at a late age, gets Social Security as an entitlement, then it's just socialism. Socialism is always stealing. Taking from some and giving to others based on nothing but their age, their group identity, is socialism.
9. Make Welfare a Last Resort. We should feel sorry for the person who has nothing but Social Security in their old age. That person will have much more if their mandatory savings grows in a personal savings account. Change the tax laws so communities of family, faith, work and neighbors can share and provide more for the needy. If every safety net fails, then give the desperately poor welfare.
10. Fix Medicare and Medicines Now. Expand the ownership society to include lifelong health and medicine savings accounts.
Get lost, AARP! You don't speak for me.
James Atticus Bowden has specialized in inter-disciplinary long-range 'futures' studies for over a decade. He is employed by a Defense Department contractor. He is a retired United States Army Infantry Officer. He is a 1972 graduate of the United States Military Academy and earned graduate degrees from Harvard University and Columbia University. He holds three elected Republican Party offices in Virginia. Contact at: jatticus@aol.com
Well, now that you mention it, I DO have my concerns about that, as well as the 14th & 17th Amendments, too...& the federal government doesn't wanna discuss the questions regarding the 16th Amendment, either. WHY WOULD THAT BE??? What have they got to hide?
Agreed! You also make a very good point about not being able to leave anything to your family.
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