lets just throw it out right now?

let the elderly fend for themselves instead of sucking from our teat... people are supposed to squirrel money away to sustain them in their golden years or be taken care of by their children and children's children!

are there no poor houses? no orphanages?

You're 31, in 34 years with 4% of your pay going into the private accounts, which are just like a 401K, the cuts in the regular benefits won't matter. You'll be doing far better than in the current system. The stock market always goes up over time.

Benefits are not going to be cut for the current recipients, or anyone who is a few years from retiring today. That's what they are talking about when they mention "transition costs".

Nobody currently in the system is going to get cut, that's why transitioning into the new system will cost so much.

Synikul, Most people aren't Bush. Most people can't throw around their money in the stock market. In fact, most people are lucky if they're even able to pay their bills on time. All this does is reward Bush's private industry friends and screw the people over. And if you think private industry is so much safer than government when it comes to handling your money, just look at Enron. Privatizing Social Security...That's like an oxymoron!

I know for a fact, from your record of posts, that you are not this ignorant. Look at the history of the market, the younger you are, the better you will do under Bush's plan.

LOL I seem to remember reading something about how in 1929 it kinda didn't go up.

I also know that YOU are not this ignorant.

Yes, it goes up and down, but you can take ANY 10 year span, and the market is UP at the end of it. That's why you do better the younger you are when this plan goes into effect.

In 1997 it was predicted that SS would not be able to meet it's obligations by 2029. Then in 2003, it was predicted that SS would not be able to meet obligations by 2042. Then a few months later the congressional budget office predicted that SS's first sign of shortfall would be in 2052. Until we even figure out what the problem is/ when it is/ if there even is a problem, we cannot afford to dump trillions of dollars to drastically and falsely reform a program that has successfully saved so many millions of peoples asses doing what it has always done.

And yes, younger people would actually get screwed if you privatize Social Security... There have been two recent studies that show that it's the younger ones that would have to bear the costs of transforming the program. This is because the added costs arise from the huge increases in federal borrowing needed to finance the new accounts, while continuing to direct payroll taxes to existing benifits for current retirees. According to the Congressional Budget Office, "to raise the rate of return for future generations by moving to a funded system, some generations must receive rates of return even lower than they would have gotten under the pay-as-you-go system."

http://www.socsec.org/publications.asp?pubid=503

And hey, thanks for saying you don't think I"m really all that ignorant...Your a pretty cool guy yourself there!!

The Institute for women's policy research(liberal) agrees with you.

The CATO Institute(libertarian) disagrees, as does The Heritage Foundation(conservative).

So are we going to quote foundations to each other?

The problem is, the liberal fears about it don't make sense, while the conservative approach does make common sense. Is the stock market higher today than it was 10 years ago? Yes. Was it higher at that point than it was 10 years prior? Yes. You can keep going back and back with that question and the answer is always yes. If the liberal arguments are true, then we're all wasting our money by putting it into 401K and IRA accounts. I'd rather have my Social Security taxes help with that.

I swear, I think a big issue liberals need to take care of for safeties sake in this country is teaching the republican party the definition of the phrase, "Imminent Threat". You bought into it when Bush spouted that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction already about to be fired at us, now your going to believe him when he says we need to hurry and fix Social Security... Like I said in the first post in this thread I made forever ago, the only really big problems we're having with Social Security right now is the problem of Bush constantly borrowing and borrowing from it to fund very unnecessary measures that have resulted in huge deficits. One quarter of which, is extra defence spending. The other three quarters, the inaccurate funding for the plundge in revenues, which those in turn ,are largely due to Bush's tax cuts. These problems thanks to Bush, are the real imminent threats we need to take care of first. Now hang on here, this will tie in with the reform issue in a moment... The only way to take care of these imminent threats right now is to either increase taxes, or slash benefits from programs like Medicare, Medicaid, National Defence and/or Social Security... Programs that millions of millions of people depend on. Now we know National Defence is out of the question, and we know raising taxes is definetly out of the question, so we're left with the only other places where your going to find the money... Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. This is where Bush tries to blame the liberal Social Security system itself for doing what its doing. Now, if you look back in (I think around the late 70's/early 80's, not too sure) There was a problem where we said, "The baby boomers are going to create a few problems once they hit retirement age." And we basically made it so the program ran on a surplus, which in turn because the program turned out to work so well, the estimated time the trust funds were said to run out kept going further and further into the future because the program worked so well at running surpluses. But Bush tries to take your eye off of the ball and puts a very expensive idea like reforming Social Security as a top priority, which his idea itself, would totally ruin the program. Now you know as well as I know republicans have hated Social Security ever since it came about. They (and you probably) have called it a socialist program that should have never came about. It may be socialist, but it works. Privatizing Social Security would basically get rid of all the security aspects of it. Because it is not just a retirement program. It also helps the disabled and helps those get out of poverty. If we were to privatize it, what would most likely happen is that people worst off, would get nothing out of the program, and people who never really needed it would do great in it. Another problem with privatization is that the privatized operating cost are about 15 to 20 times the operating costs for Social Security, which is just more benefeciary for business. Though there is the option of putting them in index funds to get almost no business, it has been found most people just do not know how to make basic decisions about investing. Do you know the difference between growth stock and income stock Synikul? If so, good for you... If not, don't feel bad, only 14 percent of Americans knew. Did you know that that when interest rates rise, bond prices go down? If so, good for you! If not...only 38 percent knew that anyways. People need to be aware that it is very important to have government take care of certain things like this... "Rugged Individualism" sorry to say Syn, sometimes just does not work in a more advanced/modern society.

I also bought into it when Clinton said the same thing back in 1998, based on the same information from the same CIA director. Was Clinton lying, or merely mistaken?

It has to be hurried because of political opportunity. The election is recently over, and republicans have a bigger majority in the senate. It has to be done now, before the next congressional election in 2 years, or it might never be done, and we can't afford that. It isn't like the voters didn't know this was coming. Bush talked about doing it in both of his campaigns.

Bush and the current congress have done that, and every president and congress since the 60s, with members of both parties eagerly joining in, with or without tax cuts. That's the way it works in America, unfortunately. When there is a big pile of money sitting in Washington, they can't resist spending it. The private accounts address that problem, they create a real untouchable SS trust fund that is owned by the individual.

Tax cuts increase revenue. Reagan proved it in the 80s, and it's happening again.

He's addressing the cost of health care also. He's starting to go after legal reform, which will lower health care costs for everybody, including those that depend on Medicare.

Medicaid NEEDS to be slashed. Did you know Medicaid pays for people to buy shit like over the counter dandruff shampoo?

And again, he isn't CUTTING Social Security. Nobody is going to get cut who is on the program. It makes the program more expensive in the short term to make it stronger and self sufficient in the long term.

We don't know exactly how bad the baby boomer problem is going to be, because we don't know how long they are going to live, but it will be longer than their parents. Also when they make those predictions about surplusses, they fail to take into account that they will spend the surplus on something else, and that's another bipartisan failing.

It isn't going to ruin the program, it's going to change the program.

No reform plan even mentions SSI, which is the part that deals with the disabled of any age. That isn't going to change because we're not going to let people die in the gutter just because they have an unfortunate crippling accident at a young age.

The retirement aspect of the program has to be addressed because that is where the long term problems are.

That happens in any new program, then the operating costs go down over time as it becomes more routine. If you're talking about a brokerage taking their regular fee that they charge on all their customers, I don't see the problem, unless they try to gouge SS accounts. If that happens, the gov't will go after anyone who does that.

That's a stock that pays a dividend vs. one that only pays when you sell it at (hopefully) a higher price than you bought it.

Yes, it's easy to pick up on that just by following the news.

That's where you're wrong. I don't know where you got those percentages, but I would dispute them. More people than ever know what those terms mean because a majority of the population have IRA and 401K accounts, and if they don't know, they can learn easily. If they're stupid, that's what brokerages are for. It can be handled by the private sector as well as the gov't, if not better.

All apologies for the delay in responding...

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Originally Posted by Synikul I also bought into it when

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Originally Posted by Synikul Clinton said the same thing back in 1998, based on the same information from the same CIA director. Was

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Originally Posted by Synikul Clinton lying, or merely mistaken?

Honestly, I couldn't have cared less for Clinton. Besides pulling a few economic miracles by reversing the shitty trickle down policies of the Reagan and Bush years, and some other things... He was pretty much a republican in my eyes. So don't expect any Clinton shots to knock the wind out of me... Yeah it pisses me off that Clinton said what he said. But I couldn't see Clinton ever giving Tenet a medal of freedom afterwards for god sakes.

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It has to be hurried...etc

Would I be right to presume that what your talking about is this "Mandate"? Well I hate to burst your bubble, but Bush doesn't have a mandate. A Wall Street poll shows that only 35% of the population thinks that Bush has a mandate to privatize Social Security, while 51% thinks he doesn't. Then when that same polling asked if privatizing Social Security was a "good idea" only 38% said it was. So why do republicans think they have to tackle this issue when most people don't even think it is an issue?

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Bush and the current congress have done that, and every president etc...

I suppose you would have liked Gore's "Lockbox" idea then... But anyways, when the governments borrows, they do exactly that. Borrow. The problem with Bush is that because of his economic policies... He can't pay it back. The government is legally obliged to pay back anything it has taken from the trust fund, and Social Security is legally obliged to pay benefits, so long as there is money in the trust fund. The only way that trust fund would be in danger, would be if there was a fiscal situation in which we had to pay up our debts to foreign bondholders. So it's not Social Security itself that is in danger, (Hell, some economists even predict the system could go on forever based on numbers showing the economy would grow much slower in the future than it has in the past...) The real threat is fiscal irresponsibility, something that George Bush practically flaunts.

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Tax cuts increase revenue. Reagan proved it in the 80s, and it's happening again.

I don't know about that. Economists William G. Gale and Peter R. Orszag, reported that if Bush made his tax cuts permanent, (Which he intends to do) they would generate...

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...backloaded revenue losses over the next 10 years. Combined with a minimal but necessary fix to the government's Alternative Minimum Tax, making the tax cuts permanent would reduce federal revenues by almost $1.8 trillion over 10 years — and that's in addition to the $1.7 trillion of revenue losses already locked into law. By 2014, the annual revenue loss would amount to $400 billion, or 2 percent of gross domestic product — almost the size of this year's federal budget deficit.

And! To offset the revenue losses in 2014 would require, for example, a 48 percent reduction in Social Security benefits. Not cutting Social Security eh? See, this is what gives me a headache. Bush saysthat all these successful government programs should be reformed for the sake that government should not be pampering it's citizens, when really he's just reforming them (at highly expensive costs) to revolve around his tax system which is basically a government hand out itself. This is why that laizes fair empty headedness is such hypocritical bullshit. When someone says "We should give government welfare to the people who need it." They go on and on about "Rugged Individualism" and how government should stay out of peoples lives. But then when it comes to the rich..."Give em money! Give em money!"

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He's addressing the cost of health care also. He's starting to go after legal reform, which will lower health care costs for everybody, including those that depend on Medicare. Medicaid NEEDS to be slashed. Did you know Medicaid pays for people to buy shit like over the counter dandruff shampoo?

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Your going to have to be more specific about how he's reforming it and why it should be reformed in the first place. From what I heard, Bush is going to have to spend $8 trillion to follow through with his plan though, and that's not good for anybody! But who cares if it helps people buy that kind of shit? If it helps some people clean themselves up who cares? Besides, I seem to remember a $388 billion spending bill that got passed recently. Should I even bother to name some of the ridiculous things in it that we spent our tax money on?

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Nobody is going to get cut who is on the program. It makes the program more expensive in the short term to make it stronger and self sufficient in the long term.

I already addressed the cutting part of it, so I'll get to the sufficiency... Your correct in saying that it will be expensive in the short term. But your presumption that it will pick up speed and sustain it self in the long haul is incorrect. A CBO analysis of Plan 2, which is widely believed to be the base of Bush's SS reform plan (I say believed because he hasn't even said how his plan is going to be brought about or where he is going to borrow the money.) shows that though it would take $1 or $2 trillion to cover transition costs which everyone knows about already, that would just be the borrowing over the next decade. Privatization of SS would cost an additional $3 trillion over its second decade, $5 trillion the decade over that, and another $5 trillion the decade over that. By the time the privatized SS would start to save money (if it ever did...which it wont) we would have gotten ourselves $15 trillion in extra debt. Plus, if there was even any legitimacy over the imminent crises over the SS trust funds, privatizing it wouldn't even get rid of that threat. If privatized SS ever did start saving money (.......Which it wont.) It wouldn't even show any signs of it until around 2045.

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We don't know exactly how bad the baby boomer problem is going to be, because we don't know how long they are going to live, but it will be longer than their parents. Also when they make those predictions about surplusses, they fail to take into account that they will spend the surplus on something else, and that's another bipartisan failing.

In a way your right. We've been suprised time and time again that whenever we had a set date in which we thought it would start having some problems...It just goes further and further into the future. Not once after legitimate testing have we ever said, "Oh my god, it's sooner than we thought!". And I already told you...What's borrowed from the surplus is legally obliged to be given back. Only one recent difference is the fact that our president is being a moocher and feels that he has to give the money that once helped people, to all his rich buds out there. It's almost funny that he has somehow fooled so many millions by excusing it with "Well...They're creating jobs!" HAHA...But that's a debate for another time.

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It isn't going to ruin the program, it's going to change the program.

No, it's going to ruin it.

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No reform plan even mentions SSI, which is the part that deals with the disabled of any age. That isn't going to change because we're not going to let people die in the gutter just because they have an unfortunate crippling accident at a young age.

About 1/3 of SS recipients are not retired workers. That's around 17 to 18 million people. The payroll taxes that are taken out to pay for personal accounts are funds that support today's payments to recipients of Social Security's survivors and disability insurance as well as retirement benefits. When you take money out of SS benefits and divert it to private accounts, you take money from those 17 to 18 million people who were counting on their guaranteed income. Also, because those who are disabled do not have the capability to really hold a steady job for the most part of their lives, they can't put in as much income to support there private investment, resulting in a crappy account to depend on when they need it. Proposers of privatization have even admited that having the existing benefits for the disabled would greatly increase the financing costs of private accounts. There's no doubt that a lot of these programs would be cut.

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The retirement aspect of the program has to be addressed because that is where the long term problems are.

What long term problems?

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That happens in any new program, then the operating costs go down over time as it becomes more routine. If you're talking about a brokerage taking their regular fee that they charge on all their customers, I don't see the problem, unless they try to gouge SS accounts. If that happens, the gov't will go after anyone who does that.

Like I already said, the price to fund privatization increases over time. It would never begin to pay for itself. And if the government would step in like you said, to put a stop to any illegal activity...why not just let the government do it in the first place? Eliminate the middle man.

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That's a stock that pays a dividend vs. one that only pays when you sell it at (hopefully) a higher price than you bought it.

::Thumbs up:::

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Yes, it's easy to pick up on that just by following the news.

Why go through the trouble?

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That's where you're wrong...etc

Well, I think I'm right. I don't know if your saying my opinion about rugged individualism is wrong or if your just saying all I said was wrong...or both. Either way, why would you want your money in an unpredictable market? You know how you conservatives blame the huge budget deficit on the market bubble bursting in 2000? (Even though the market did crash by the way, it wasn't because of it that we have these deficits...) Think about it... What would have happened if there were SS trust funds in that market? What about those people who would have planed retirement around that time? Knowing your money is going up and down! Up and down! I'd rather put my savings in a government program where I'm guaranteed to get X number of dollars. That's the beauty of todays Social Security, you don't have to learn all the crap to keep an eye on it.

One other thing I forgot to add... Though it was really his only good...Well, lie that he could come up with for robbing the poor ($140 billion in social program cuts through 1984) to fund unnecessary military programs ($181 billion) and government welfare to the super rich ($190 billion), Reagan didn't prove at all that tax cuts created new revenue...

Department of Commerce figures show that tax cuts for corperations from 1973-1975 and 1979-1982 (Yes, Carter wasn't any better) caused a steep drop in capital investment. Not quite the growth Reagan was speweing to everyone that would "...balance the budget". In fact, the sharpest rise in capital investment was during (1975-79) when corporate taxes were slightly higher than they were the previous 5 years.