Is Social Security Welfare?

[CaptLouAlbano]

No, he paid 200 grand in taxes last year. He took nothing from from YOU or young people. How much taxes did you pay last year?

Exactly, any money I received in SS payments is simply a discount on the taxes I pay. It's the same for any retiree who has a decent income stream. The average SS benefit is around 1200 per worker (that would be a person who earned a decent, but modest amount their whole life). So let's say that retiree was smart, saved and invested a little to take care of himself when he retired. He sets up an annuity for himself and draws off it around 8000 per month, that's not an obscene amount of money - probably close to what he made when he retired. Well at 15% tax on that guess what it comes out to be? You guessed it - the 1200 he gets in SS payments.

Basically, this guy is living tax free - that's a good thing, and he is hardly someone who is "rich". They aren't taking the money from anyone, don't be fooled by that - it's all a big fricking shell game. If they eliminate the SS tax, they will raise other taxes to offset the cost.

 

[Yieu]

No, but are you arguing that the government should have 50K more of my income than they do now? Because if, as you suggest, my SS payments disappear that is essentially what is occurring. I am all for finding a way of getting rid of SS, but simply saying folks like myself shouldn't get the payments, is in effect saying that our taxes should go up by that amount. It all comes from the same kitty, whether it is Federal Withholding or FICA it's all the same, just on different lines of your check.

No -- I am saying that the taxes on current workers should go down by the amount they are being taxed by the SS tax. The payments ending would be a side effect of being relieved of the tax, because the payments come from the current SS taxes being taken in. I would also like the income tax to be ended, and I find it to be immoral.

 

[squarepusher]

Ok, so you guys realize this is a Ponzi scheme, yet continue to support and pay into it?

 

[Yieu]

Ok, so you guys realize this is a Ponzi scheme, yet continue to support and pay into it?

We don't have a choice. The money is taken right out of our pay. That doesn't mean I support it other than by force, though.

 

[ClydeCoulter]

Ok, so you guys realize this is a Ponzi scheme, yet continue to support and pay into it?

Yea, I don't want to loose my house, at the point of a gun, that I built with my hands.

edit: King George will surely come for it, otherwise.

 

[ClydeCoulter]

Yea, I don't want to loose my house, at the point of a gun, that I built with my hands.

edit: King George will surely come for it, otherwise.

Perhaps I need to get rid of attachments.

 

[Origanalist]

Everybody here want's it ended, otherwise we wouldn't have supported Ron Paul. But telling those that had their money confiscated by force that they are taking welfare when they get some back isn't going to do anything but make some people feel morally superior and piss off others

This needs to be done, but sitting here pointing fingers isn't going to do it.

 

[klamath]

Pretty much that is it. When a smartass punk tells a guy that he should have paid 250 grand and was a thief because he was only paying 200 grand a year in taxes it pretty much a personal insult.

 

[KrokHead]

Ultimately with Social Security we got to cut our losses. I'd rather see more useless things like warfare, welfare, and "education" spending cut first but any cut is a win, any compromise the liberals win.

 

[Warrior_of_Freedom]

Yes. Anything that pays people not to work and encourages irresponsibility is bad.

you want senior citizens to work until the day that they die?
Their SS checks don't even pay the bills anymore

 

[stu2002]

Title 42 United States Code says Yes

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42

 

[loveableteddybear]

you want senior citizens to work until the day that they die?
Their SS checks don't even pay the bills anymore

No, I want people to save while they're working.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

But it's not going to change in any of our lifetimes. It's called the "third rail of politics" for a reason.

Oh, nothing lasts forever, HB. Especially enormous, top-heavy, arrogant, extremely expensive (and extremely broke) empires like the United States. The empire will collapse eventually. This could very conceivably -- though not necessarily , sorry survivalist doomsayers-- happen within our lifetimes. This collapse would cause Social Security, and all the other state trappings, to be radically changed.

Now what these changes are, depends on how well we've done our job -- how many of the populace believe in and understand the ideas of liberty. If the collapse were to happen tomorrow, our existing system would likely be replaced by something quite a bit worse, something highly regimentized, militarized, and authoritarian.

We have work to do.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

you want senior citizens to work until the day that they die?

I want senior citizens to be free to do whatever they want. But I also want their gravy train to end immediately, of course. That is the only decent course of action. Stop robbing the poor and the young to pay the rich and the old. Socialist Security is the most regressive income redistribution scam around.

 

[helmuth_hubener]

The only people morally justified in taking the SS's blood money are libertarians, that is, people who firmly believe the money should not be being stolen, and would gladly push a button to end the SS immediately if such a button existed.

Those taking the stolen money who do not believe that the system of theft should be ended -- and immediately! -- are indeed just accomplices to the crime. They are happy to take food out of the mouths of the very poorest demographic and use it to pay for their high-dollar cruises and flat screens and prescription pills. They need to educate themselves on why theft is evil, even if done on a massive scale by people calling themselves the state, why the SS is indeed theft, even though it's never called that, and why it must be ended immediately, even if that means they get nothing to show for all the money that was taken from them through the years.

 

[CaptLouAlbano]

So there are a few here that want to see if eliminated immediately. So let me pose these stats and see what solution you have for the issue:

According to this article and others 23% of people 65 and older live in households that depend on Social Security for 90% or more of their income. Now we know the average SS payment is around 15 grand per year. So let's say that you can have your way and you eliminate SS overnight. As was previously quoted, seniors who have retired within the past 10 years wait 17 years before the "get back" what they "put in". What do you do with those 23% (which amounts to around 8.5 million people) who now go from having about 17 grand per year to having 2 grand per year to live on?

Now I am not saying that SS is a problem. I have opposed it my whole life, as did my father who was part of the Old Right and was a political activist at the time of its implementation. But the fact is, we do have the program, and there are people who, right or wrong, rely on it for their existence. So how do you, who support its immediate elimination (as helmuth_hubener said above me he would "would gladly push a button to end the SS immediately if such a button existed") address the fact that at its elimination you will have around 8.5 million Americans trying to live on $2000 per year? What is the solution for the greater problem that would then exist?

 

[CaptLouAlbano]

Double post

 

[helmuth_hubener]

Taking in the big picture of reality as a whole makes the whole "looming disaster and abject poverty for millions" fade into a much smaller threat than would seem from the numbers you posted, CLA. "Income" may be zero, sure. But what's their net worth? On average (median): $170,000 (see http://www.quizzle.com/blog/2012/02/the-elderly-are-getting-richer-the-young-not-so-much/ ). So what could they do with no income but a $170,000 nest egg? Well, invested at a 5% rate of return, which is a very attainable long-term average, they'd be making $8,500 per year. They also could just cash it out for $17,000 per year for ten years. If they are thinking they're going to live for more than ten more years, then yeah, maybe they should do something productive and earn some income. If they anticipate living for ten more years, they are clearly in fairly good health. Humans are built to be productive, to take on challenges. Laying about or recreating aimlessly for decades on end at the end of life is not natural and not, in my opinion, healthy. This is when you could be the most productive, the most valuable! You've spent a lifetime gaining knowledge and skills. Put them to use! Your body may be deteriorating, but the skills and mastery programmed into your mind and hands are still there and are priceless. Why waste them? What a tragedy! What if Michelangelo had retired? Or Mozart? Or Steve Jobs? The last ten years of true masters are almost always their most phenomenal period of productivity. People seem to have this idea that it is kind of shameful or ignominious to be working when you're 80; that as a society we somehow shouldn't allow this to be the most attractive choice for old people, or maybe even permitted. We would be embarrassed to have a situation where the old had to work for a living. We should be proud, instead, that we give them a stipend, like children, allowing them to lounge about and enjoy "retirement". Sorry, I don't buy into this.

 

[CaptLouAlbano]

Taking in the big picture of reality as a whole makes the whole "looming disaster and abject poverty for millions" fade into a much smaller threat than would seem from the numbers you posted, CLA. "Income" may be zero, sure. But what's their net worth? On average (median): $170,000 (see http://www.quizzle.com/blog/2012/02/the-elderly-are-getting-richer-the-young-not-so-much/ ). So what could they do with no income but a $170,000 nest egg? Well, invested at a 5% rate of return, which is a very attainable long-term average, they'd be making $8,500 per year. They also could just cash it out for $17,000 per year for ten years. If they are thinking they're going to live for more than ten more years, then yeah, maybe they should do something productive and earn some income. If they anticipate living for ten more years, they are clearly in fairly good health. Humans are built to be productive, to take on challenges. Laying about or recreating aimlessly for decades on end at the end of life is not natural and not, in my opinion, healthy. This is when you could be the most productive, the most valuable! You've spent a lifetime gaining knowledge and skills. Put them to use! Your body may be deteriorating, but the skills and mastery programmed into your mind and hands are still there and are priceless. Why waste them? What a tragedy! What if Michelangelo had retired? Or Mozart? Or Steve Jobs? The last ten years of true masters are almost always their most phenomenal period of productivity. People seem to have this idea that it is kind of shameful or ignominious to be working when you're 80; that as a society we somehow shouldn't allow this to be the most attractive choice for old people, or maybe even permitted. We would be embarrassed to have a situation where the old had to work for a living. We should be proud, instead, that we give them a stipend, like children, allowing them to lounge about and enjoy "retirement". Sorry, I don't buy into this.

I am 74 years old. I know many people in my age bracket that would be screwed in your scenario. And net worth typically includes their home, so that's bullshit. Basically, you are saying to the 90 year old widow - screw you, sell your house and go back to work. So much for the libertarian principle of non-aggression.

The comforting thing is that ideas like yours only get bantered about on internet forums where self-styled political philosophers can spew their "wisdom". In the real world there are traditional conservatives and libertarians who are working on real solutions. Ron Paul's was one of them.

 

[klamath]

I am 74 years old. I know many people in my age bracket that would be screwed in your scenario. And net worth typically includes their home, so that's bullshit. Basically, you are saying to the 90 year old widow - screw you, sell your house and go back to work. So much for the libertarian principle of non-aggression.

The comforting thing is that ideas like yours only get bantered about on internet forums where self-styled political philosophers can spew their "wisdom". In the real world there are traditional conservatives and libertarians who are working on real solutions. Ron Paul's was one of them.

Pretty much what you are talking to are the libertarian la la land people. They live in their dream world of libertarian philosophy, quoting the books of their demigods. They cannot look at human nature and deduct that their utopia might not just mesh with it. Their mind set pretty much matches that of Mao and Stalin, to hell with the short term consequences of their forced immediate conversion to the utopia libertarian state. If 8 million old people unable to work die, to bad! It very much reminds me of the cultural revolution Mao inspired with the youth in China. Kill the old people they are a drag on society and are to fault for all the problems in society. Instead of Mao's little red book, they wave Mises etc.
Human nature just seems to keep repeating itself from one generation to the next.