What do you think about increasing Social Security benefits?

If it’s a benefit that can be sustained, can be funded, and congresscritters can learn to keep their boogerhooks out of, then it’s a form of socialism I’m strangely comfortable with. :-)

$600/month doesn’t buy much. I’m with jholler on this one. Stranger things have happened ; )

Nobody is saving money on 1000$ per month or less. Damn near every cent of that is pushed back into the market (you know, buying the shit you make and sell everyday). I can’t say the same for the person that made 10 million last year. Trickle down is bullshit and everyone that agrees with the concept is already rich or so fucking deluded that they think “The American Dream” will eventually land on their face.

John McCain approves of that message.

I don’t believe that many retirees are dependent on stock dividends for basic living expenses. This year’s freefall on Wall Street may affect those who are taking long cruises around the world or decided to retire at 55. Most of the retirees I know are like the couple on Obama’s program tonight who owned their home outright and lived frugally. But because of the wife’s health problems, the bloated cost of medicine and the rapid increase in the cost of living they had to mortgage their home and a 70 yo has to work for minimum wage at Walart. They didn’t need an increase in their social security, they needed a govt that didn’t encourage crazy credit, they needed laws that didn’t allow companies to misuse empoyee pensions, they needed a not-for-profit healthcare system.

An increase in social security benefits would have to be funded by more borrowing, or an increase in the social security tax. Given that the SS system is already predicted to be in deep doodoo in a decade or so, and we need to cut benefits or raise taxes or both in order to fund the retirment of baby boomers, this does not seem likely to me.

However, I’m all for it!

Show me the money!! Show me the money!! Show me the money!! Who has it? Who doesn’t have it? Redistributionism R us.

It seems sound to me. But it is socialistic. That concept has caused quite the pissing match on other threads. I however like the idea.

There is nothing wrong with a moderate amount of collective caring for weaker members of society. Why is it charity in the private sector, but socialism in the public sector? If we want to spend our money to help others, then our elected officials shoud do it.

I wonder why Republicans call it socialism to discredit it? Do they really think the private sector charities can handle the entire burden? Do they really think there can be any fairness in a private system? Private systems can be much more coercive, as they make you sit through religious talks and various other things in order to qualify for help. Private systems are stigmatizing, because they call it “charity.”

In a public system it’s “benefits,” and, while there is a hell of a lot of bureacracy involved, at least it isn’t directly ideologically coercive.

I think there is a great ammount of extremest fear on both sides.

The richest people worry about people taking way to much of their money unfairly and paying unfair taxes.

The middle class view every single rich person like the heads of AIG because mass media controls so much of what we see and a bad story is so much more interesting that a good one. (This case may change that as a bad story screwed us all and a good one may mean the end of those “Lets hope were rich and retired before this house of cards falls” f*ckers).

Or We only hear about or consider the extremes of the situation because money is a very personal issue. So we we get emotional and become unwilling to explore a solution in the middle ground.

And an even bigger problem is our current government is mired with politicians on both sides who are in the pockets of lobbiests or who are so concerned about their seat that they don’t want anything to do with solving the problem. They just want to ride it out.

I think there are whiners all over. Poor or rich,it doesn’t matter.

However, the rich in the US seem to be much more whiney than anywhere else. In Europe, I believe that there are tax rates up to 60% for the wealthiest, and this doesn’t drive them all away.

If you are more competent or more fortunate, then it seems to me that you would be glad to do more for your country than others do.

Well, Social Security IS increasing in 2009, 5.9% This is the largest percentage increase since 1982: http://is.gd/5fYG

Anyone have a link to any increase beyond this?

@ zStasiuk – cool icon and welcome

I get the feeling a lot of people don’t have an understanding of Social Security. It is like a group policy to insure people have an income when they are no longer working due to age. If you put in money from the age of 19 until you are 59 and then die, your contribution stays in the pool to support folk who live longer than average. Soc Sec is is also an earned work benefit because our employers match our contribution. Like any other insurance or annuity the money is invested (SS in govt securities) to keep up with inflation. The government actuarial tables set the distribution guidelines and distribute the funds. There is a cap on the contribution so that while the minimum wage worker has a total contribution of 12% on every $ earned, the high income employee pays nothing on anything over $100,000. Thirty years ago the cap was just $10,000.

So what do most people think wrongly about Social Security?

It is a government handout…wrong, it is a money contributed by workers and employers. The only money that comes from the goverment is the interest paid because the govt borrowing from SS funds.

The govt is giving SS recipients a whopping increase, the biggest in a generation…wrong, the govt is required to give a cost of living increase, it should be covered by interest on the $$$ trillions the govt has borrowed from SS. The reason the COLA is so high is in part because of the poor economic management and govt policies have given us a whopping increase in everyone’s cost of living.

The government could ameliorate the expected 2040 shortfall in Social Security in a number of ways, So far what they have done is raise the age to collect a full benefit. For my Dad the age was 65, for me it is 66+, for my daughter it will be 69. So more people will die before or within a couple of years of retirement, thus receiving a fraction of what they contributed and leaving more money in the fund.

Another thing that could be done is to take off the contribution cap so that every $ earned would pay, not just the poor and middle income earnings.

Third we could pay the national debt. A large portion of that money would be returned to Social Security and be available to pay retirees into the 22nd century.

It’s a bad idea, because America’s Federal Debt is Beyond Comprehension.

“Unfortunately, the reforms withered on the vine, as did the discussion. Nobody wants to talk about the problem. Nobody, that is, except Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin), the ranking Republican on the House Budget Committee. Ryan says the federal government is headed for bankruptcy if it continues on its present course.

Ryan cites an estimate by the non-partisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) that says the government faces a $53 trillion shortfall to cover the costs of promised benefits in its entitlement programs.

“They say we are $53 trillion short of fulfilling the promises the government is making to the American people, in today’s dollars,” says Ryan.

The former Comptroller General of the United States, David Walker, has been saying much the same thing, making it his main priority since leaving office. Walker points out America not only has a large deficit but the real problems are off balance sheet obligations.

For example, the U.S. has more than $44 trillion (that is 44 plus 12 zeros) in unfunded obligations to Medicare and Social Security alone — our country’s retirement and health care system for retired citizens. Add that to the current liabilities and it soon bloats to $53 trillion, as of September, 2007. And, if predictions are correct, our debt is now in the range of $55 to $56 trillion.

Walker figures $53 trillion will cost the average American household $455,000. Since the average family income is $50,000, that is an implicit mortgage of over nine times their yearly income.”

@galileogirl

What happens to the money supply if we pay off the national debt?

What happens if the govt borrows the money contributed by me (and 150,000,000 other workers) and our employers and refuses to pay it back?

1. Rep. Paul Ryan becomes the ranking member of an ex-political party
2. There will be a peoples political revolution unlike anything since 1776.

BTW Ryan’s numbers are waaaay off. He exaggerates the individual national debt by a factor of more than 12. But We have allowed ourselves to be ruled by fear instead of good sense for 8 years. Why should it be different now?

http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

His numbers arent way off. If you notice, the $44 trillion is for unfunded obligations to Medicare and SS. The national debt does not include these numbers. He then adds the $9 trillion(national debt at the time) and gets $53 trillion.

The 9 trillion is just money owed back to the central bank, aka the Federal Reserve.

Unfunded future obligations like my rent, food and utility bills. If we stop paying for ruling the world and get our house in order we will be able to pay future obligations with future revenue

@chris,
The last presentation I saw on the national debt was about 2–3 weeks ago when I saw George Soros being interviewed on Bill Moyer’s Journal. The figure he gave was $56 trillion in total debt, of which $3 trillion was the Iraq war; $85 billion was the recent financial bailout; and about $6 to $7 trillion in unfunded Social Security and Medicare liabilities; the rest of it i.e., the bulk of it is a 25-year run-up in mortgage and credit card debt and trade-related debts owed to countries like China and Saudi Arabia.

On the plus side, economy generates or “earns” $13.3 trillion in GDP.