I'm interested in hearing what people think about this. Does this strike anyone else as being something worth fighting for?
It's definitely something worth fighting for, and I'd drop out in about .0001 second if given the choice.
The problem is how to pay Social InSecurity benefits for those who wish to remain in the system, and especially for those who have built up a large "investment" in the program.
Could you flesh out those ideas a bit?
D
Fat Teddy and other dims are already on record as having opposed letting their constituents who are fed employees opt out of sosh security , let alone the rest of us ordinary
folks
I love the idea!
As with private accounts, the Democrats will squeal because in essence both are in present times a tax cut of massive proportions. Think of all the money congress has pilfered out of Social Security and spent through the general fund and replaced with IOU's. BTW - I prefer either to the robbery taking place today.
"Why not let Americans drop out of Social Security?"
I have always believed we could drop out of SS whenever we wanted.
I've heard of several people who say they already have opted out .. so why is this supposed to be "something new".
Hey I wonder. I'm glad I never had a chance to opt out. The return that I get from what I paid into SS are fabulous. I got all my money back pretty quickly and it's still coming. Don't see how any private plan could have improved on this return. BTW It's not the power of compound interest, it's the power of inflation that got my money back so quickly.
I can't focus on anything about the SS debate until the dangerous idea that Bush recently advanced -- to limit benefits to the wealthiest people -- is destroyed and discarded. This is exactly how socialism creeps forward.
First they say only the "very wealthiest few" will be paying into a system, but not eligible for benefits. There are so few people affected, and those don't really expect to be reliant on these benefits anyway, that there is a chorus of support from the huge majority who will benefit from this changem and it goes forward. Gradually, a combination of inflation and explicit redefinitions which add "just a few more people" to the list of give-but-don't-getters, and politically palatable new laws exempting "the very poorest" from paying in, while still being eligible for benefits (and that definition is, of course, regularly redefined to make sure nobody has to start paying because inflation put their wealth or income over the threshold) results in the system becoming more and more a straight take from the rich and give to the poor scheme.
At any given time, so few people are being added to the list of those getting screwed, that there is never sufficient political opposition to stop the next step of the creep. But it just keeps creeping forward until a huge percentage of the population is in the getting screwed category. Medicare is already in the universal getting screwed mode on the front end -- since there is no limit on the amount of income that is subject to the Medicare tax, higher earners pay a whole lot more, but aren't entitled to any greater benefits. Just wait -- it won't be a whole lot longer before we're hearing that in order to keep Medicare solvent, it will be necessary to remove just "the very wealthiest" from eligibility for benefits.
Democrat leadership will tell you that to allow some to opt out will 'drastically increase the deficit due to the lack of inflow through FICA taxes' ... and you realize of course that FICA taxes are dumped into a 'general fund' from which the democrats have proven they will fund every new program they can get passed into law. The only real solution is to return FICA taxes to a separate accounting and reduce spending! But of course, politicians of both parties will not address that reality since they spend YOUR tax dollars to empower their re-election.
Agreed. Make social security voluntary. It is simple and easy to sell. Democrats arguing against a voluntary social security plan will be exposed as the dependency-creating socialists they are.