Posted on 11/14/2010 1:07:03 PM PST by La Enchiladita
Baby boomers withdrawing funds from Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are going to "crush the system" in a matter of years, a member of President Obama's blue-ribbon commission on the debt warned Sunday.
David Cote, CEO of Honeywell and one of a handful of private-sector chiefs appointed to the 18-member fiscal reform commission issuing its final recommendations on Dec. 1, said he didn't realize -- even perched at the top of his field -- that the next decade will be disastrous to the nation's accounts ledger unless something drastic is done.
"It scares me that as a financially conversant CEO, I didn't know how bad this was going to get in the next 10 years," Cote said on ABC's "This Week." "The thing that everybody misses is it's my generation, the baby boomers, who are going to flow through Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. It's going to crush the system."
"Social Security is going to go cash negative in five years. It's going to go broke in 2037," added Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., another member of the commission who appeared with Cote.
Medicare is "prepared to go permanently cash negative in just 10 years. So, obviously, those things have to be reformed; there have to be some changes," Conrad said.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
My opinion, though, is that the deepest cuts should be made in Medicare and not in monthly benefits. I have never believed government is responsible for my health and Medicare is way too costly. That includes the ill-begotten prescription drug thingie.
My husband and I have put a lot of our money into the social security system over our lifetime. If we had been able to invest that same money as we saw fit....we’d be much better off today.
David Cote, CEO of Honeywell and one of a handful of private-sector chiefs appointed to the 18-member fiscal reform commission issuing its final recommendations on Dec. 1, said he didn't realize -- even perched at the top of his field -- that the next decade will be disastrous to the nation's accounts ledger unless something drastic is done.
What needs to be done, and what I rarely hear discussed, is to eleiminate all of the “entitlements” which were never meant to be funded by SS. And, if somebody wants to offer to give me all the money I’ve contributed to SS and all the money my employers have contributed (ultimately it came out of my pocket), I’ll gladly take it and opt out of the system. After all, I wouldn’t want to be a burden to anyone....
Enjoy my 30 years of contributions you old farts.
This has been common knowledge for as long as I can remember - and I’m 41!
We should just give the billions they confiscated from us, over the past 50 years, back to the government....Just tell them to keep what they took...
(((wow))
There are more than 50,000 people a day signing up for SS. It doesn’t take a computer scientist to understand the problem with that.
But your money has gone to make other peoples lives better via big government handouts and payoffs to favored constituencies. Just like all good liberal programs.
Doesn’t that make you feel better?
Ditto that...
Not investment advice but a potential replacement vehicle to replace at least half of the Gov't run system is already in place and under the Demublicans in DC...That Solution?
The Roth IRA...
The Maxium Roth contribution is not far away from the SSI Contribution Caps (Unless Obummer removes them).
Split the difference or go for the higher amount and let individuals stick 1/2 their SSI contribution ( Theirs, not the employers) in a Roth.
Man what a game-changer that would be....
We can discuss the investment vehicles within it later...
It wouldn’t be a problem if there were 200- 400,000 new people a day contributing.
So only five more years of stealing the Social Security surplus and spending it.
We agree.
It doesn’t make us feel better at all....precisely because, in the long run, it has done more harm than good.
Hubby says that he would have felt MUCH better helping others to invest and grow their earnings too....if we had been ALLOWED to do so. Unfortunately, it was not an option.
Economic realists and conservatives have been saying this for decades.
It seems ok for the dems to finally come out and admit it, but when Republicans say it it’s bash-fest time.
Tough we paid into it where is the MONEY?
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