I'm sure they'll fix it.
Posted on 03/24/2010 7:49:17 PM PDT by Nachum
The bursting of the real estate bubble and the ensuing recession have hurt jobs, home prices and now Social Security.
This year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I agree with you, but I’ve been dicked over for my entire working life to support seniors with their SS. I want my money BACK, plus interest, and then they can let me invest as I please.Oh, I’m sorry, some government union thug will throw a tantrum when they don’t get their pension AND social security check each month.
Gimme 3 steps, give me 3 steps twrd the door......
Why don’t they give each Soshcurity recipient a small printing press, to make his own money?
You know: give a man a fish vs. teach a man to fish!
I am submitting your nomination for Post of the Day.
Let’s see 6 months a year on the west coast of Panama, new Beammer, new boat and that Benelli I’ve been thinking about.
re: Whatever they took out will be returned with interest
I think that’s the problem. There’s no money with which to pay back what was ‘borrowed’. In fact, the did raid it, when they took out billions and billions of dollars every year for years and years.
True, there comes a time when their aren’t enough workers paying in to pay all the retired workers are taking out. When they talk about the system being in the red that’s the point the mean. They conveniently ignore that the money they are having to put in from the general fund is money that’s owed to workers because it was ‘borrowed’ from them for 40 plus years.
Over the years they have come to see the system as a pay as you go system. It was never intended to be that way. The money being paid in during the times when there were 10 or more workers for every recipient was supposed to be left there, to build up for the day when the balance shifted. That’s the problem. That money’s not there, and they are so far in debt from years of profligate spending they can’t pay it back. So they distract us by acting like they are broke because there aren’t enough workers contributing now. BS, they are broke because they used the money all those years for something other than saving it for day when it would needed.
This is the whole ‘lock box’ thing. Americans who were paying in for year after year assumed the money was going into a ‘trust fund’ to be there for the day when they stopped putting in and started taking out. Now they find out their never was a ‘trust fund’. The money was being spent every penny of it, just as fast it came in.
In reality there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them!
Actually there is a difference between them.
People willing gave monies to Madoff.
Congress critters took money from citizens thru force of law, Taxes and then squandered.
I have more respect for Madoff than I ever will for congress critters.
Actually I have more respect for armed robbers,they are at least honest in their attempts to steal your possesions.
Pols have to lie and hide behind the law knowing that if they get caught,the most that will happen is they might lose their next election.
The thief with the gun might lose his life if he attempts against someone more willing to fight back.
You are correct. Dem LBJ pushed through the legislation that removed the SS contributions from the “lock box” and put the funds into the General Funds account, where Congress could then spend those funds on other things.
I’ve been drawing SS since age 62. Was laid off at age 59, but still carried as Leave of Absence Without Pay so it would allow me to collect my pension at age 60, after over 35 years at the company (so I wouldn’t sue for ageism). Had to go 9 months with no income. Just figured I would get more of my money back by starting at age 62, rather than waiting until age 67 to get a little more per month. ....I’ll not live long enough to get back what I paid into FICA over my many years of contributions, but the monthly checks do help.
re: starting at age 62
I started mine early too. I figured out how I would lose over the three years if I waited and it wasn’t enough to worry about.
I am not a fan of SS, at all. The purpose of my original post was to point out that had the system been run like it was designed to run we would not be in the trouble we are now.
Not only did they steal our money, they began using SS to handle all sorts of disability things that had nothing to do with retirement.
In today’s entitlement society many people forget it was never intended to be a worker’s sole source of retirement income. It was to be a safety net. It started out a 1 percent contribution on the first small portion of a worker’s pay. But like anything government does it took on a life of its own. And it grew and grew and spread its reach into more and more of our lives. Now we have the results common to EVERY government program. It’s to the point now that every worker covered is making a 15% contribution to their retirement fund. Only to have it stolen and then made to feel guilty, as though it was something they’ve done that got the program into trouble!
Words cannot describe the disdain I have for anything government.
They want to inject the 401K because of all us greedy savers.
Who knew Ponzi schemes were a fraud? Bernie Madoff is rotting away for less.
True. Even if it was kept in a "lock box", there still wouldn't have been enough money to pay retirees the kinds of benefits they have received and continue to receive. It was doomed to fail from the start and it is starting to fail at warp speed as a result of this recession.
I think you will see them remove the cap for SS taxes this year just before the elections.
re: wouldn’t have been enough money to pay retirees the kinds of benefits they have received and continue to receive
My understanding is that if they had kept to the original plan they would be able to handle those who had paid into the system and then retired. They backed out on several increases in the contributions over the years because there was so much money there they couldn’t believe they would ever need it.
And if they had kept it for its original purpose. But instead they have loaded all sorts of people to the rolls who are not retired, many of whom never paid a penny into it.
Like everything government does, it looks good on paper but putting it into practice falls prey to the greed of our elected officials and those entrusted with running the programs.
The only answer I see is for the entire system to collapse on itself and let the producers rebuild it. It’s a house of cards and you certainly can’t fix one of those by moving a few cards here and there. And especially not by piling more and more cards!
Simple, eliminate SS
And yet they never mention that back in the 60s the very solvent ss fund was diverted by LBJ to pay for his great society programs(as it is still doing).
It didn’t matter so much then because the Baby Boomers were still ‘babies’ - but the real reason the dims did it is because those stealing the money knew they would be long gone by the time the bill came due.
Now of course the media will act like the fund is broke because not enough was paid in ... there was enough paid in at one time but, like pols on the state and local level, the feds couldn’t stand to see that money just sitting there when they could be bribing each other and buying votes with it.
Just like what goes on today.
No big deal. Congress had already planned ahead for this day. There is plenty of money in the Social Security Trust Fund. All they have to do is cash some of those IOUs. /s
If a corporation or organization ran their business like these ‘trust funds’ have been run for years everyone who had anything to do with running them would be in prison. That’s the problem. We consider Bernie Madoff a criminal. We consider Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, et al ‘congressmen’. In reality there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them!
That’s cuz they spent the dime.
I'm sure they'll fix it.
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