Posted on 08/29/2011 11:34:13 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Texas Gov. Rick Perry is standing firm in insisting that Social Security, the federal government’s insurance programs for retirees and disabled, is a Ponzi scheme designed to deceive the young.
In a weekend campaign stop in Ottumwa, Iowa, Perry, who has surged into the lead in the Republican presidential sweepstakes in at least one major poll, repeated his characterization of the social insurance program that is generally supported by the electorate. He has made the same point before, especially in his book, “Fed Up!,” though at one point his campaign tried to explain that he had softened his language.
“It is a Ponzi scheme for these young people,” Perry insisted. “The idea that they’re working and paying into Social Security today, that the current program is going to be there for them, is a lie.”
At a later stop in Des Moines, he also threw cold water on his own campaign’s efforts to portray his position in a more tempered light. “I haven’t backed off anything in my book. So read the book again and get it right,” he said.
Perry’s stand is the type of vintage ferocity that the governor has generated in his Texas political career and even in his limited time as a GOP presidential hopeful. For example, he has suggested that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke would be behaving in a “treasonous” fashion, if he loosened the money supply in a presidential election year.
Despite complaints from some quarters that his choice of words in condemning the Fed was too strong, Perry has stood firm in that area as well, raising questions about when a colorful and forceful position crosses the line into political gaffe.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Perry, you just pealed your own death knell. Stupid is as stupid does.
When you’ve been as wrong as Rick Perry has been on as many issues as Rick Perry has been, saying water is wet is not going to be the saving grace it would have been if you had disagreed with him on those many issues.
Perry is a national disgrace, if you’re a Conservative.
If you’re not a Conservative, he’s just swell.
Yeah Ricardo, there is no Social Security Trust Fund. Who knew? I’ll sure listen to everything you say from her on out, so I can become better informed. /s
Here we go, another election cycle with pretenders wanting desperately to be the pretender in chief.
“It is a Ponzi scheme for these young people,” Perry insisted. “The idea that they’re working and paying into Social Security today, that the current program is going to be there for them, is a lie.”
Spot on, Governor!
“SS is on a perfectly sound footing, except for the math.”
Hahaha, good one! That was getting me angry, then I just had to laugh at myself...
There are a fair number of people who do not understand the scam that is Social Security.
Some of them call themselves "conservatives" and post on this board.
And of course there are others who simply lie about the fiscal integrity of Social Security either in pursuit of an ideological agenda or for personal gain.
Our work is cut out for us. There is now a candidate for the GOP nomination telling the truth about Social Security. We have fourteen months. If Social Security reform is not a prominent issue in the November 2012 election it will be because we, the conservative American grassroots, have failed to accomplish what our country needs for us to accomplish.
Medicare is a far bigger problem than Social Security in terms of long-care deficits. While both are unconstitutional, Social Security is basically a defined benefit program with Ponzi aspects, and the advantage of it compared to Medicare is that the costs are relatively predictable. Medicare, on the other hand, is going to bankrupt this country in the next 15 years if we don’t address it post haste.
You have to tread lightly on this issue. He can say its a scam, but has to make it clear that he’s not taking it away from anyone currently getting it.
Paul Ryan didn’t market his plan well and the GOP suffered (for a while, they seem to be back up in the R vs. D congressional ballot now) for it.
This is what people will love about him. Hey, he did this in Texas to Bill ‘Elmer Fudd’ White....he’ll not change. This is how he has won all his elections...even when the Bush Clan told him to play nice...he was smart enough to ignore that advise. He won because he did it his way and the way you win elections.
A number of them post on FR.
You are saying he should lie to keep up with the pack?
The TRUTH is that SS would be viable forever if the government kept it’s mitts oof th9ose funds, and secured those funds for those who paid into it all of their lives.
I do not think this was a good subject for Perry to bring up during a racr for office unless he includes a fail proof method to replace it.
Governments at both the federal and state levels have so many regulations and requirements relating to private health insurance companies that seniors would be hard pressed to find a comparable plan on the private market, especially if they have some health issues. The one thing about Medicare is that it basically has no cap on enrollee spending. If you want to make private health care affordable to seniors, you have to remove all of the regulation or red tape, or it will be simply unaffordable. Seniors don't need private plans that cover things like abortion or STD screening, for example.
The elimination/phase-out of Medicare has to come with significant repeals of federal and state legislation governing the health care industry. This would allow for more competition in the market and allow for more companies to offer catastrophic plans. The system we have now is broken -- even the private system, because it decouples costs from benefits. If you are covered by your employer under a typical private health care plan then you have almost no incentive to reduce your health care costs.
Five or six taxpayers used to support a retiree. Soon it will be down to one or two taxpayers supporting one retiree.
The math doesn’t work.
There is no "trust fund". Social Security is operating at a cash deficit now and will continue to do so from here on out. What is called a trust fund is just a bunch of IOUs the U.S. Treasury has written to itself. Current claims are paid out of current receipts supplemented by other current taxes and new borrowing. Nothing has been set aside. All revenues collected up to this point have already been spent. Period.
Try to plow throw my 51, if you will.
It has been sold as a retirement plan. That’s the purpose of those stupid little fliers the SSA sends out every year, showing your W-2 income/SS wages and projected benefits. They’re misleading people into thinking “I’ve worked and paid in X, and the SSA tells me that I will be getting at least Y in benefits if I retire at 62, and Z benefits if I wait until 65...” and so on. The government has promulgated this propaganda, and much of the public has bought it, hook line and sinker.
Since the funds are co-mingled via the holding of debt which funds the budget deficit, let’s quit worrying about the accounting charade of a “trust fund.” There is no lockbox, there is no segregated pool of “this” money vs. “that” money. It’s all one big slush fund which Congress has been pissing away for decades, but at a rate in the last 10 years which hastens all event horizons. Last year, the SSA started paying out more benefits than it was taking in receipts from payroll taxes. That event was supposed to first happen in 2017. Well, tomorrow is here now.
There is now a locked and loaded weapon pointed at our fiscal situation: The exploding amount of debt has been issued at the short end of the curve... and when interest rates go up (as they eventually must, when the Chinese and Japanese get tired of being paid negative real yields to buy our debt), the interest payments on the national debt are going to explode upwards - to $800B or more per year, if they only return to nominal levels by historic standards.
To your “if’s”
1. We would need to phase in an eligibility age increase very rapidly. When the age of 65 was first chosen, that was the MEDIAN life expectancy of an adult white male in the US. ie, half of males would be dead by the age of eligibility, so the only issue was survivor benefits for the man’s wife and minor children (if any).
We have a situation where life expectancies are going up rapidly thanks to medical advances, and the rise in SS eligibility age has to be increased 10 years right now to catch up to current male demographics. We can’t take decades to get to a point where one has to be 75 to collect SS - we need to be there in the next five years. That’s not going to happen.
2. OK, remove income caps. Trouble is, there’t just not that many people in the cohort above the current cap, and there are likely to be a lot fewer in the near future. While removing the cap is justifiable, it makes a very small dent in the problem, which is one of stagnating wages, declining labor force participation rates and a huge influx of deadbeats from other countries.
3. Benefits can be adjusted up/down, and the formulas have been messed with before. Heck, we’ve messed with the computation of CPI to get around the COLA increases - to our collective detriment. We’re lying to ourselves about the rate of consumer inflation, and have been for more than a decade to limit COLA increases in Social Security. This is like using a hammer to change your spark plugs - the wrong tool for the job.
On Medicare: Fully agree, but that’s a whole ‘nother discussion.
There are plenty of people on this board who lack either the brains or the 'nads to say what Perry is saying.
At current yields, if the SSA buys US debt, they won’t be keeping up with inflation either. We currently have negative effective yields out to about the seven-year maturity on the yield curve.
You have to pose this properly, and make sure the people understand it.
The GOP doesn’t fail due to “extremist” ideas, they fail (when they do) because of bad marketing and ineffective sales techniques.
Reagan was the master at this. Perry seems well poised to follow in his footsteps.
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