Both SS and Medicare will have to be "means tested", increased eligibility age AND benefits frozen at inflation minus x percent to have any chance of bringing the deficit under control without raising taxes.
And yes, it's an approach I support.
Then don’t call it ‘Social Security’ anymore, call it what it really is, ‘welfare.’
Wow - another progressive.
Actually, this is worse than taxing the rich. Because he wants to punish those who paid the most into SS and Medicare, and reward those who paid little or nothing.
You are spot on. While I don’t much like Graham, he is talking the truth here. It is the middle class entitlements that drain the coffers of the government, and get people dependent on federal ‘aid’. That was the most devious thing about the New Deal. Even Roosevelt knew that welfare was unpopular. When he changed the game and got the middle class dependent on government, he set the stage of this nation going bankrupt.
If you want Social Security to be gone (any rational person should since it is a moronic ponzi scheme), you first need to remove the ties it has to the non poor recipients. Once you ween them off the system, you will finally have enough of a voting coalition to kill it.
As for those who say they deserve it because they paid in, well I’m sorry, but like all other ponzi schemes someone gets left holding the bag. Unless you want the entire economy taken down, which is what we get if we keep waiting to face this unpleasant truth, we have to get on the road to controlling the entitlements and that means Social Security and Medicare.
Before that happens, I would support gutting ALL public employee pensions to SS levels, and cutting the federal government to not much more than Dept of Defense and State Dept. Eliminate Dept of Education, HEW, EEOC, ALL federal support for welfare of any kind, and THEN we can talk about cutting SS benefits for people who've paid in for all their lives.
The ENTIRETY of the Welfare State should be utterly eliminate, not just "managed".
That's the approach I support.
Before moving on to the approach *you* support let me tell you the approach *I* support:
-drug testing for anyone on welfare, food stamps, Section 8, WIC
-immediate cessation of any benefits for anyone breaking the law
-work required by everyone receiving benefits. Even if you can’t walk you can still contribute in some way.
-Begin reducing benefits to unwed mothers. Cut them drastically if they get pregnant again.
That’s just for starters.
Do you also advocate means testing and freezing benefits for your 401(k) account, and your savings account, and insurance plans?
“Both SS and Medicare will have to be “means tested”, increased eligibility age AND benefits frozen at inflation minus x percent to have any chance of bringing the deficit under control without raising taxes.
And yes, it’s an approach I support. “
OOOOOOOH....you stepped on the third rail here on FR.
I happen to agree with you, but only if we get rid of it altogether and have folks apply for the welfare that it is.
Yes, folks paid in, and the government stole their money.
Unfortunately, with this program, no matter what you do, somebody gets the royal screwing. There are merits to the various arguments, but in the end - we can’t pay and we shouldn’t keep pretending that we can. It’s over now, or it’s over soon. Take your pick.
OK I can go along with means testing for us “wealthy” folks. But on one condition only. Stop taking the fruit of my labor and investment NOW. Otherwise you are just robbing me and my family like the other socialists who think I exist to be used as an ATM machine when you turn 65.
I agree with you that this will be necessary, but before we do that I want to see at least half the federal bureaucracy fired and the other half with a big salary cut.
"Means testing" in that case means "outright theft."
Explain THAT!
“Both SS and Medicare will have to be “means tested”
A more suitable tagline for you would be “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need - Karl Marx”
First we need to get a new understanding for the meaning of such words as fair,equal,earned, you get the point?