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Guest Post: How To Fix Social Security: A 4-Point Plan That Faces The Brutal Realities
Submitted by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds
How To Fix Social Security: A 4-Point Plan That Faces the Brutal Realities
Social Security is unraveling, and aligning its outlays to its income requires a new understanding of tough truths.
Social Security is imploding before our very eyes. As I laid out in The Fraud at the Heart of Social Security (January 17, 2011) and To Fix Social Security, First Ask Why It Is Deep in the Red (January 18, 2011), the system is already running massive deficits in 2010 that weren't supposed to occur until 2018, and the deficit in 2011 is transpiring 15 years earlier than the seers at the Social Security Administration (SSA) anticipated.
There is no mystery why the system's revenues are collapsing: 9 million jobs have vanished, and millions more have slipped from full-time to part-time or temporary. The Social Security payroll tax (including the Medicare sliver) is 15.3% of payroll. So as total payroll plummets, so does Social Security's revenue.
Roughly 8% of all private-sector jobs have vanished for good, despite what various cheerleaders project. Another 8% have slipped to "part-time for economic reasons," and another 15% are self-employed/free-lance/contract workers who have seen their incomes decline by 5%.
All of these factors have reduced taxable wages and income, cutting Social Security's tax receipts by $66 billion just from 2009 to 2010. As noted yesterday, The End of (Paying) Work (January 21, 2009) is not cyclical, it is structural, and the decline is far from playing out. SSA payroll tax receipts will not recover to 2009 levels, they will continue to decline.
Meanwhile, an aging populace is flooding into the system at an unprecedented rate. As noted yesterday, millions of financially crimped Boomers are applying for Social Security benefits the moment they qualify at 62 years of age rather than wait another 5 years for their full benefits. Many can't afford the luxury of waiting 5 years, while others anticipate the system's insolvency and are prudently extracting something before it runs aground.
Recall that the "bulge" of the Baby Boom will be entering the system within the next eight years: over 3 million new beneficiaries a year. Live births were 3.4 million in 1946 and quickly ramped up to over 4 million; the last year of the Boom generation (not an exact science--the Baby Boom is generally divided into two cohorts) in 1964 saw over 4 million births.
The first Boomers qualified for Social Security in 2008, so roughly 75 million beneficiaries will enter Social Security between 2008 and 2026. (Of course current beneficiaries leave the system when they die, but the absolute number will rise as new additions exceed departures.)
As noted in the two previous entries, the Social Security "Trust Fund" is an accounting illusion. The "safe, guaranteed" non-marketable bonds are merely markers for actual Treasury bonds which must be sold, and interest must be paid on. Social Security is as totally dependent on Federal borrowing as the Pentagon or any other program.
The brutal truth is the system is facing flat or declining revenues while its vast army of beneficiaries will rise from an already monumental 53 million. That's significantly larger than the entire population of Spain (46.5 million) and will soon equal that of Italy (60 million) or Great Britain (62 million).
Social Security is entirely dependent on the Treasury's sale of new bonds for its own solvency. If interest rates spike and/or global buyers become wary of Treasury bonds, costs for borrowing will skyrocket, crowding out all other Federal spending.
Being dependent on Treasury borrowing, Social Security will be as impacted as any other program.
Somebody who's been "promised" benefits won't receive them. That much is obvious, so the question boils down to triaging who gets benefits and who doesn't.
Income disparity has been rising in the U.S. for decades. This reality has been sliced and diced here and elsewhere, and the basic truth is that it has some structural causes (globalization, etc.) but much of the disparity is the direct result of tax and legislative policies which favor the super-wealthy (who coincidentally also happen to be politically powerful). For example, Income Inequality on Course to Hit Record Levels Thanks to Tax Compromise.
Why Growth May Still Leave 95% of Americans Behind
Middle class squeeze: The deep roots of an economic and social transformation
Without getting distracted by endless and pointless debates over income disparity, let's stipulate that Social Security is the foundation of income security for working America. People qualify for Social Security by working and paying into the system. It provides a modest pension for all qualified workers and their dependents or survivors, and the disabled.
The surest way to minimize income disparity is to put Social Security at the top of the priority heap, and the people within the system who have no other pension at the top of the priority heap within Social Security.
I would hope that much is self-evident.
The counter-arguments against changing anything are plentiful: the system only has political support, we're told, because everyone gets their check, regardless of need. OK, go ahead and leave the system untouched. Then when the whole thing implodes, the neediest recipients will suffer more than those with other pension income.
Is that fair? Or just? Does that serve the nation better than recognizing income and wealth disparity are realities?
The notion of noblesse oblige needs to be restored to American culture. The cultural drift to self-absorption and limitless greed has poisoned the society to the point that we are told millionaires will stop investing in productive businesses and will move to Tortuga if they have to forego some consumption to pay additional taxes.
Noblesse Oblige is the sense that those who have gained or earned great wealth have an obligation to those below them on the financial ladder.
Here is my short prescription of how to adapt Social Security to reality, with the single goal of protecting the pension income of those who have no other retirement resources. Are any of these politically possible? No. But just because they cannot be done in the present doesn't mean that they shouldn't be done.
I am not including slowly raising the retirement age for two reasons: 1) it's basically a given and 2) it won't solve the revenue/outlay misalignment by itself. We need to make much more fundamental realignments:
1. Jettison the illusory "Trust Fund" and remove the SSA from the unified Federal budget. Social Security is a "pay as you go" system in which current workers' payroll taxes are distributed to current beneficiaries, with a surplus that accumlates to fund future shortfalls. Unfortunately, the surpluses accumulated over the past 27 years have already been squandered, and the Treasury will have to fund any shortfalls between Social Security outlays and income with 1) tax increases or 2) additional borrowing.
Will politicos ever let go of the fat income stream from Social Security? No--but they should.
2. Replenish the squandered surplus in two ways: eliminate the $106,000 cap on wages and impose a 5% Noblesse Oblige tax on all households with incomes (from any source) above $1 million. If you're pulling down $1 million annually, you're already paying a lot of taxes--but then your tax burden was lowered tremendously by the Bush-era cuts. You can afford a $50,000 Noblesse Oblige payment to Social Security, with the explicit understanding that the money is for those in the bottom tier who have no other pension.
Why should earnings above $106,000 be except from the 7.65% FICA tax? If you're making $156,000, please don't claim you can't afford to pay 7.65% on the last $50,000. Anyone claiming that means they don't want to forego some consumption they desire. Come on, the 7.65% on the $50,000 is a modest $3,825.
3. Reduce the benefits for everyone with another fixed-benefit pension. According to the SSA, the average benefit is about $1,100 per month. All beneficiaries with other fixed-benefit pensions will forfeit their Social Security above a total monthly gross pension/retirement income of $3,000 a month.
Again, the idea here is to recognize income disparity as a reality and to protect the most vulnerable citizens who have worked and paid into the system. The idea that "everyone who paid in should get their share" is gone, triaged out of existence.
The reality is that double-dippers and triple-dippers (those with military and/or civil-service pensions, for example) drawing $3,000 or more a month can survive without their Social Security check; the same cannot be said of those who have no pension other than Social Security. The whole idea here to protect those workers first. There simply won't be enough money to pay everyone, so those with pensions of $3,000 or more a month will not draw anything from the system; they will survive without it.
Those with private non-fixed pensions will be subject to the same limitation (above $3,000 a month, no Social Security), but with the caveat that should their private pension fall below $3,000/month, then they would be eligible for a modest SSA benefit.
This recongizes that IRAs and 401Ks are not guaranteed; annual income in such plans will vary with interest yields and investment returns. Again, the idea here is that Social Security is a backstop for those with no other pension resources.
4. Encourage people to work past 62 years of age, and encourage disabled citizens to earn whatever money they can. The key disparity in Social Security is demographic: the number of workers paying into the system is stagnant while the number of beneficiaries is rising.
The easist way to forestall collapse is to maintain the working populace. Yes, I am aware that enabling the over-62 populace to keep working means fewer jobs for younger people, but anything which keeps people as contributors rather than just as beneficiaries is a net positive.
Demographics are against a retirement system designed in the 1930s. People live longer and retire earlier now. No system that leans on two workers to pay for one retiree is sustainable. These trends have been described in depth in numerous books, for example:
Fewer: How the New Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our Future
The Coming Generational Storm: What You Need to Know about America's Economic Future
As for the disabled, many disabled people could earn some money (doing computer work, for example) if the system didn't preclude them from earning any income.
The idea here is simple: stop punishing productivity and work. Encourage people to contribute to their own livelihood until they can no longer do so.
The heavily promoted idea that the Social Security system is "sound until 2037" is false. We can stand by and let the system implode, hitting the most vulnerable the hardest, or we can do some adult-level triage and recognize that those who will do OK without tapping Social Security will have to relinquish their claim on the system for the good of those workers beneath them on the financial ladder.
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Or you can just BTFD and save the system........ we are down for 2 hours now - an f-in eternity in this market.
BTFD you f-in bitchez!
They will, give a couple more hours. SPX will close down about 2 points to flat, as it usually does. Should see some strong data tomorrow so buyers will jump in before the close today in anticipation.
Hate to agree with Harry but...
+1 BTFD bitchez!
what a waste of time reading this nonsense. start printing the lawfull monies of the united states....."UNITED STATES NOTES"......and end all this bullshit of bandaiding a broken...corrupt and fraudulent ponzi scheme called the federal reserve. the united states treasury can route all social security and medicare payments by direct deposit at less than the cost of printing money. at nearly no cost or interest payments the treasury can spend the monies into the greater economy and the benefit of the citizens. the treasury can then go after the defense payments....can i interest any one in buying aircraft carriers for pennies on the dollar?????? i have to laugh at all the bullcrap about cutting ssi payments and pensions....that sucking sound is your answer.....an economy going down the drain. the ponzi must be fed......
Ummm, isn't that what Mugabe did in Zimbabwe - the issuance of unbacked currency as needed? Whose face should we put on the $1,000,000,000 bill?
So, you think it is better to owe the money back (with interest) to a private FED Bank???
Why don't they sell who's face is on the money as advertising (like they do with sports stadiums?) Like McD's could put the McRib on the $10 for the next 2 years. Boom - economy fixed. You're welcome.
The McBuck!
ummm....isn't that what ben the bernank is doing right now in the usa? and what the hell is backing the federal reserve note....other than thin air????
GG,
Right on.
This is what (imo) got Kennedy murdered.
Congress need to take over the treasury again, and hire an independent agency to run it.( NOT like the Fed).
Why do we pay interest on FED RES NOTES, when we can print our own, pay no interest, and put up with Wall Streets antics?.
Insanity.
This article is another socialist POS: let us increase taxes and reduce benefits to honest and hard-working people who contributed/paid to the SS all their lives. This article just offers another income redistribution proposal.
Where are the SS problems:
To be fair,
Finally, printing more money will not help. Inflation will wipe out whatever benefits are still left in the SS system.
Why the f*ck is it the job of government to confiscate money from me, on the pretense it will pay me my money back decades later when I may or may not be too infirm to work? Isn't it up to me to make such arrangements? And if I fail to, isn't it up to my family and friends to help me out, if they want to? And if, through rare and strange circumstances, I have no friends or family, then my neighbours, if they think I'm deserving of charity?
Or maybe I could sell off some of the assets I've managed to acquire during my long life? Or is it assumed I won't have acquired much in the way of assets, because Leviathan will have creamed off most of my (and practically everyone else's) wealth in its tireless pursuit of protecting us from ourselves and handing out our hard-earned wealth to those they favour this week?
this ain't ever gonna happen. how the hell would we finance the wars that give the elites the opportunity to rake in billions?
good luck. this country is not about doing anything for the peasantry beyond striping them of assets.
Unfortunately theres only one way to (Civil) to do this.
A Con Con.
Or a Civil War.
Pick your Option.
this ain't ever gonna happen. how the hell would we finance the wars that give the elites the opportunity to rake in billions?
good luck. this country is not about doing anything for the peasantry beyond striping them of assets.
I hate the term "pulling down." Everything it implies about the source of wages and profits is exactly wrong.
I know how to fix SS. Let's impose a 100% tax on everyone who thinks he's got a right to take from others! Let's called it "Moocheresse Oblige"
+1 This is just a prescription to turn Social Security into another income redistributing welfare program.
I know... I hate solutions like this one. The best solution is to remove the disparity of power between the government and its people. The rest, in time, will become fair.
Here ya go:
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/15/amending-the-constitution-t...
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/15/us-constitution-28th-amendm...
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/15/28th-amendment-first-and-se...
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/16/28th-amendment-section-3/
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/17/28th-amendment-the-rest-exp...
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/correctly-identifying-the-i...
http://strikelawyer.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/28th-amendment-an-addition-...
Don't miss the part about gold being $27,300/oz or thereabouts. But the main thing is the adjustment of the power differential.
Capitalist10
on Wed, 01/19/2011 - 12:00
#887330
"+1 This is just a prescription to turn Social Security into another income redistributing welfare program."
Prior to the 1983 SS legislation sold to the the public by cartel pitchman alan greenspan, earlier generations had only been required to fund the ponzi by paying the benefits of the generation that preceded them.
the 1983 legislation mandated that 'boomers' pay not only for prior generational benefits but also to prepay their own. as a result they, the boomers, paid more into SS than any other group.
the excess funding provided by the 1983 legislation was used, in part to fund the deficit driven dynamics of supply side economics, and, also to fund the tax cuts for the wealthy that were a primary compnent of that 'trickle down' masquerade.
SS monies were first used to pad general fund shortfalls during the vietman war. they have been used relentlessly since then to cover any and all shortfalls in federal budgets.
Actually, Social Security is the most racist and discriminatory institution in America. You'd think it was designed by the KKK in the effect it has on black Americans' wealth, and in fact, it was.
The South was a solid Democratic block, and when FDR and the Dem's swept into power in 1933 many of the congressional committee chairmanships were held by Southerners with decades of seniority including the ones designing the SS system. Not to hard to figure out that these guys were in their 50's, 60's and 70's, so that meant they were born and grew up in the 1860's, 1870's, and 1880's. In other words, during the post-Civil War Reconstruction your-ex-slave-is-just-as-good-as-you racist nightmare.
When they designed the SS everybody-pays-in-and-the-elderly-collect system, the life expectancy for blacks was under 50 and for whites it was under 60. This ten year disparity has continued to this day, with white women and men being about 85 and 81 and black women and men being about 77 and 73.
So blacks work their whole life, paying into SS but then get to collect hardly any of it. But they do get to support the Colonel and his Missus, sitting in their rocking chairs on the veranda sipping their mint juleps. Just like in the Antebellum days.
And just like when they were slaves, when they die their families get nothing. There is no ownership interest in your SS "contributions". In fact, the widow's benefits get cut. If all those SS taxes had instead been going into their own IRA account for 50 years garnering a long-term market return of 8% the account would be worth millions. Yes, MILLIONS! Do the math. And black families would inherit it and become rich in the course of just one lifespan.
So why do blacks vote solidly Democratic????
blacks work?
Maybe they should "work" on getting their life expectancies up
the rest of your uncle tom screed can get flushed
Thank you for your erudite contribution to this discussion.
So, my tally seems to stand at 1 junk and 1 moron.
Zerohedge just ain't what it used to be.
Sadly, politics is often described as 'the art of the possible.' Many, if not all, rational ideas are considered impossible in the current Empire of Greed. Perhaps, when it all falls apart, rational things will be considered possible once again.
THE PERFECT STORM, BITCHEZ!
Here's a one point plan for saving a system that doesn't even need saving (evidenced by the fact that we're talking about something 20 years away in a business cycle that operates on the basis of mili-seconds):
1. Eliminate the cap on payroll taxes.
A second element, to tax the hell out of derivatives, would address the rest of the 'solvency' issues.
But we all know that, in a system run by banker-gangsters, taxing these hucksters and thiefs isn't on the agenda.
Don't forget a $0.50 per transaction tax on any trade made in any market including OTC.
Or, print more money
Now that would just be silly.
Everyone knows you have to borrow it first!
Another advantage of recomendation 3) would be to encourage more realistic retirement planning and savings among the upper middle class. I'm sure most people at ZH are not counting on SS being here in 10 years (I doubt 2 years), but the majority are currently planning their retirements around it.
But I'd prefer to think out of the box: The truth is the USA can not afford the mortality and morbidity of aging any longer, and the chinese will be 20 years behind us. For that matter, Western Civilization can not afford it in our endless battle with our cultural enemies who are now out-breeding us 6-to-1. We need to develop a cure for aging ASAP, bringing the Aubrey de Grey coined "Methuselarity" in closer to 2020 rather than it's probable schedule of 2035 by intensifing research. We need to turn the demographic battleship's guns on our enemies, rather than accept societal retreat and defeat.
gao,
Bro that is GODS call.Not mans.
Most of us on this site have paid in a shitload of cash into this system.
Like a lot here, I can get by(barring major changes economics/health/gvt etc,etc),for the better part of whats left of my life.
But, and huge BUT, my wife & I did not work ourt asses off JUST to get by.
We planned.So, my biggest issue is why should the fiscally responsible, get fucked in the deal?.
There is a way to fix this, IF Washington would be fiscally responsible, and cut everything to the bone that is a MUST to run the country.
Starting with them.
But it will not happen.So, riddle me this, WHY do we have to suffer loss, when the elites will never, ever, have to feel one iota of pain?.
Plus, the $3k figure?, BS, try living on and maintaining a home, and utilities ,and everyday costs of living on $3k a month.
A family of 2 cannot do it,even downsizing, and renting.
Uh oh, it looks like our cancer-creation machine is about to break down. How shall we fix it?
How about . . . we don't.
"About to" = 20 years from now.
How many banker-gangster bailouts will we have between then and now?
There is zero chance that SS in its current form lasts 20 years. It's even money to last 5 imo.
It's silly to even think about it in static terms when the wholly owned politicians are giving payroll tax 'holidays' every year as a back-door way of sabotaging the program while, at the same time, increasing income inequality (that's their job, after all).There's no need to "back-door sabotage" a submarine with a screen door.
Fair point. The back-door sabotage is going on concurrently with the full frontal assault in the form of QE and tax breaks for corporate welfare queens.
how about...dead fuking right.
It doesn't seem likely that SS would suddenly be declared insolvent/bankrupt and millions of recipients are suddenly cut off from their entitlements. That would entail a complete dollar collapse (black swan event) and immediate geopolitical upheaval.
What movie am I thinking of?
"Empires will fall! Chaos will reign!"
I strongly dissagree with point 2, why should any1 be penalized for their good earnings? And it's not a question of 'can afford' if you can 'afford' 5% than why not 15% or 25%, why not just go straight to Communism and have the State confiscate all income and distribute it 'evenly'
There should be a flat tax of x% for everybody and if you're too stupid or otherwise to make a living than do every1 and your self a favour and put a gun to your head.
Num Lock key stuck?
Be careful what you wish for, I don't think you'll like the results if you get what you want.
I'm in favor of a flat tax of 0% for everyone.
I hope you like wagon ruts instead of roads then.
Yup, because the state is the only entity capable of providing such services.
Azan
why not just go straight to Communism and have the State confiscate all income and distribute it 'evenly'.
Your sir, are dead on, this is exactly why you / we need to get as much as possible out of this Demonic system NOW.
I can hear it now.............an Emergency POTUS address, declaring all 401k's,ERISA's,Annuities,Trusts, IRA's, have been seized.
The amount you will recieve from your accounts,will be determined by a Special Fiscal Policy Panel, appointed by myself, and Congressional leaders.
We will let you know the details as we work them out, in the most fair, and logical way.
<why not just go straight to Communism and have the State confiscate all income and distribute it 'evenly'.>
Well, under Communism the State confiscate all income as well as all estate.
However, there is NO EEQUAL or EVEN distribution under Communism. There are Masters who live in "Communism" (the Party leaders who live like kings and pharaohs before them) and the rest (who are just slaves entitled to nothing). This is why any Communism always comes with a dictatorship (to keep slaves under control).
More "social justice" instead of liberty. It's posts with these types of ideas (which aren't ALL bad...but in general the premise is) that show just how far this nation has moved from liberty and individual freedom toward socialism.
An especially critical freedom, according to Milton Friedman's decaying, rotting corpse, is the the freedom to steal from those who actually work through the use of force and violence.
do you two lil monkey's think that you will be kings when the lights go out?
what do you two think will happen... when the polite people who are stealing from you are re-placed by people ruling you? wait? let me guess? not you(s)? you will stand and fight oppression in any form that presents itself, then... just not now? sure.
I think allowing bankers and other assorted hoodlums train-wreck an economy is a stupid business practice.
And I think your decision that people who haven't been bailed out should do us all a favor and die and slightly ... off-putting.
They will continue to do what they have always done: serve their corporate masters like the good sociopaths they are.
the biggest problem we all face is the corps have no master any more... the majority are zombies, leveraged and sold off.
I have a better plan than the one advanced here. Sorry Mr. Hugh.
Anyone older than 60 gets his benefits. Anyone younger, never mind. And then close this entirely corrupt fund down forever. It has been a DC slush fund for long enough.
"Anyone younger, go work on JPMorgue's plantation."
And while you're at it, fuck yourself and die.
fuck that
why should people at 60, the statistically richest demographic, get benefits while everyone else just PAYS forever and gets nothing?
Because some of us don't like the idea of seeing our grandparents starve to death.
then maybe you should fucking feed them!
I wonder how anyone aged didn't starve and die throughout the entirety of recorded history up until the SS Act.
Family provided for them. I still remember that grandparents lived with their kids and mostly the woman who stayed home took care of them.
Now my wife can't do that!
I sure hope that in 30 years my kids won't have to provide for me.
Well that's how it used to be, family and neighbors helped out family and neighbors. They didn't look to the state to save them. That was until the state fucked everyone over at the same time then tossed out the life raft acting as the "savior" to the problems they caused in the first place. Now so many people look to the state to solve everything when they should be looking in a mirror.
why...don't you provide for you kids now?
I sure hope that in 30 years my kids won't have to provide for me.
Well, if you're being paid a pension by the state, then that's exactly what they will be doing, via their taxes. The big difference is they'll also be paying for the multiple layers of bureaucrats who get to decide how to divvy up their money 'fairly'.
By the time I reach retirement age life expectancy will be down 10 years. I also expect the concept of retirement will not exist any more. The majority of grandparents will work in their children's home economies; making clothes, tending the garden, watching the young children, etc. Every bit of resources spent on todays retirees will be shortening the lives of the younger generations. There will have to be trade offs.
It's fine to protect those that are literally starving to death, but screw the baby boomers who will have had the cushiest lives of any generation ever on this planet, not to be seen again for hundreds of years. Welcome to the other side of the energy curve.
So, the average life expectancy will decline, grandparents will tend to gardens and make clothes until they die, and the quality of life will only decrease as time goes on?
Are we moving backwards in time now?
Yes. That's what happens when you burn through millions of years worth of solar energy in a couple hundred years. See:
James Kunstler: The Long Emergency
John Michael Greer: The Ecotechnic future
Jeff Rubin: Why Your World is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller
Edit: Also see Europe after Rome's collapse, S. America after the Mayan collapse, Easter Island
Then give them some of your money.
<some of us don't like the idea of seeing our grandparents starve to death>
Why don't you feed your own grandparents? Do you really expect I will do it for you?
Why do people at 60 get the benefits? The program is designed to pay out at 60, I suppose. Those that are hitting 60 have already paid into the system for 40 years. The same as you are going to.
The thing younger people don't consider is: whose property taxes paid for your education and why. The answer is the people now hitting 60. And they did it not because you are a special little snowflake. They did it so you could be productive and pay their social security.
And you'd better understand that you're going to.
A guess- Cdad is 60 or older? Just a guess...
60? Born in 1950. 19 during Woodstock.
Let me see if I get this correct. So, the generation that when asked by their country to do for their country responded with "Hell No We Won't Go" now wants the country to do for them.
Go FUCK YOURSELF!
How many 100K served in Vietnam?
Dude, we paid for your education (property taxes), and all sorts of other things to promote your "self esteem". You "Reagan babies" are going to do your part.
You've got no choice.
The Fed is already fixing SS by printing more money and declaring no inflation = less real outlays in fiat terms with no C.O.L.A.s
Wow, not one fuck so far.Only one bitchez.
What wrong fuckers?
are you adding something interesting or--- are you subtracting?
give a good fuck or take it away; your choice.
Where doing OK until you showed you're youth....
<<<<Encourage people to work past 62 years of age, and encourage disabled citizens to earn whatever money they can.>>>>
Working past 62 is not an option for most people. Besides by 62 a worker has already contributed 40+ years if thats not enough go back to the drawing board.Disabled means what the word says... for most work is difficult and few professions available. .
Come on: what better way to solve a problem of booming population and unemployment crisis than by making people work for more hours and get paid less? We're shooting for 75% unemployment, after all, among twenty-somethings!
Don't you see: serfdom is the only answer.
For most disabled people hardly. The author is absolutely correct, they are discouraged from trying to work because they will lose their disabled status.
Most of the people on disability I know do side jobs for cash under the table.
ditto
It is telling what we have become, when TRILLIONS can be shuffled to banksters at little or no cost and the PEOPLE can be forced in to poverty. Both parties raided social security for their benefit. Democracy and Capitalism are failed models
How about the government just divvy up some plots of land to people and call it even.
I like separating SS from the Federal budget.
However, I just don't like the system as it's set up. It was intended to help little old ladies near the end of their lives. It was not intended to be a retirement plan.
If they don't phase out the program, at least ramp up the age to 75 at the minimum. Say increase the age by a year every two or three years. That will save a whole bunch of money.
A 65 year old person now is not decrepit. Nor is a 70 year old.
A 65 year old person now is not decrepit. Nor is a 70 year old.
Really? Try telling that to someone who works outside for living. You'll get the ass kicking you deserve.
So - they're too decrepit to work, but sufficiently undecrepit to kick my ass?
A 65 year old person now is not decrepit. Nor is a 70 year old.
Really? Try telling that to someone who works outside for living. You'll get the ass kicking you deserve.
A 65 year old person now is not decrepit. Nor is a 70 year old.
Really? Try telling that to someone who works outside for living. You'll get the ass kicking you deserve.
People with physically demanding jobs could switch to less demanding jobs when they age. For example, if you are a mechanic and crawling under cars gets to be too much then you could work behind the parts counter or train young mechanics.
This was the way things were in the past. People did whatever they could to be productive. These days the mentality is different. People just want to get paid for staying home and doing nothing.
Exactly. It's an entitlement society.
I have the answer, it would be easy.........
PRINT the money, and send the amount paid in by the boomers, to the Boomers.
Lump sum.
No more SS.
No more payouts.
If we can PAY for the entire worlds issues for as long as I have been alive, give away trilions to foreign countries,the least the PTB can do is just send us a check.
Then you young fuckers, have nothing to concern yourselves about.And, all of us go our merry way.
We are printing the shit out of it now, why not pay off the outstanding anmounts?.
ITS OUR earnings, not yours, or theirs.
Humpty Dumpty, Humpty Dumpty.
Like most children's stories, we fail to see their broader applications. Government is broken and it can't be put back together again. You cannot unscramble an egg.
The production of government is a loss leader. Therefore, you will continue to generate smaller margins, the more you depend on it to push sales.
The purpose of government is power, control and the sharing of costs of production by the wealthy on the entire population. For example, if you need to ship products, you need a method: train, roads, airlines, etc. Why pay the total cost to ship your product, when it can be borne by all of society through taxes. Why pay the full cost to protect your wealth, when you can convince society that we should all share equally in the expense?
The concept of government is a failure. As the population has become capable of greater independence and the ability to solve problems through independent networks and associations, the need for government is shrinking- yet, in an effort to maintain control and transfer wealth, it continues to grow and become more tyrannical.
The solution to social security, unfortunately, will require tremendous displacement and pain, but it a solution that insures future liberty rather than totalitarian poverty and a return to merchantilism. Minimum government and maximum liberty. Eliminate taxes and allow those with the most to lose, to pay for their protection. The wealthy need to stop living as parasites on the general population and pay the cost of their production.
Capitalism is broken; can't be fixed.
Time for something new.
Capitalism stopped being practiced in the late 1800's. We have been socialists since then. Socialism has always been broken.
I suppose that's nice in the world of theory. But here in the real world, gangsters are stealing from the world just as they did in 1600 and 1700 and 1800.
Capitalism is about the means of production being accumulated in private hands. We have that today on a larger scale than ever before.
And we're suffering the consequences - environmental holocaust, poverty and widespread unemployment.
Your desire to go back to the halcyon days of chattel slavery and the encomienda is funny.
Almost as funny as your ignorance of economic history and theory. Capitalism entails the use of free markets to encourage the development of capital through increased production and the creation of wealth.
While the means of production will reside in the hands of the minority, that has more to do with the preferences of people- would they prefer to consume or produce. In a free market, people are free to choose how they will use their wealth.
We do not suffer because of the wealthy, we suffer because the wealthy have created and maintained governments of their choosing. We suffer, because we lack the initiative and responsibility to change said governments. We suffer because we allow fiat currencies to circulate and pay taxes for the debts of the elites. We suffer environmental holocausts, because we fail to protect private property.
It is our willingness to choose a sliver of security in the face of the unknown, sacrificing our liberty because of cowardice and a herd mentality reinforced by an educational system designed by the elites to keep us passive that allows for our present state of slavery- all reinforced by a compliant media.
My desire to go back to the halcyon days of classical liberalism, when workers accumulated more wealth and were more productive than any other time in our history (check the numbers of 1870-1890) even though the banks of the time were trying to dump fiat credit into the monetary system and were allowed to suspend their payments is a testament to what capitalism can do. It is also why the system was changed.
this is all fucking irrelevant.
We ALL rode an energy supply wave and the "system" we used really was immaterial. Prosperity came irrespective of it.
Now that energy supply has appeared to inflect, we are seeing that nothing seems to really work anymore. We founder in vain, failing to see that our notion of what CAUSED the present was really logically fallacious.
Our human constructs of commerce and interrelation have no bearing whatsoever on the rate that the earth will yield oil to us. If the sun were to dim substantially tomorrow, would it really matter if we were communists or capitalists?
We are facing REAL systemic headroom here, not a crisis of humans except that we failed to plan. We really are not so far removed from the Easter Island experience; we only believe ourselves to be.
Look around you - do you really see any broader enlightenment out there? Or is it really just a cargo cult with flashier merchandise?
Wow. You kind of nailed it there. "A cargo cult with flashier merchandise" pretty much sums up where we're at.
Human history: lather, rinse, repeat. What a stupid animal we are.
Jesus H, man. Everything revolves around peak oil with you. As the saying goes, you have that hammer....and everything's a nail.
Sean7k is exactly right. Free the market, eliminate gov't, and prosperity resumes. Heck, even your (irrational) fear of peak oil has its best shot at resolution through a completely free market.
So yes, Sean7k's comment is relevant. You just have to take those off those oil drum blinders....and put down the Mike Ruppert BS.
bla bla bla
everything revolves around this bullshit laissez faire with you guys.
Look, moran, we haven't had laissez faire in 100 years, yet the prosperity rolled forward. You don't have a clue what caused the prosperity or what prosperity even means in a physical sense.
We measure prosperity by per capita energy consumption. It's really as simple as that. But, sure man, if it makes you feel better, I'm certain that if we eliminate government and all get together and hold hands, everything will go back to the way it was during the dark days of regulations and socialism.
You clowns act as if the Fed Act was an anathema or that the government is a huge inhibitor - how, then do you explain the RELENTLESS forward march of 'prosperity' during all of these things? You're suffering from the same myopia as the Fed's braniacs, searching in vain for a solution within the system when the reality is that all your Plato's cave opining about the "way things work" was a bunch of crap.
Cargo cult, indeed.
We've never had laissez faire. But Sean7k is right, the closest we came was in the latter half of the 19th century.
I'm not interested in wading through your insults to understand your point of view beyond the peak oil talking points. But this 'relentless march of prosperity' is the stuff of daydreams. Best case, it could have been better. Worse case, you are totally misguided. IMO, whatever march towards prosperity we've experienced has been in spite of, not because of, government and its agents like the Fed (transpose the two if you like, it makes no difference to me).
And by no means am I naive enough to believe we'd all get along without government. A free society founded upon property rights (and absent gov't) is the foundation for prosperity. Surely there will be criminals...but most likely they won't be wearing several thousand dollar suits.
ah, the halcyon days of sweatshops, child labor, and 7-day work weeks...I cannot wait
When was it, again, that free markets existed? During the robbery and piliage of the "New World"? Nope.
During the age of Mercantilism and the slave trade? Nope.
During the phase of American history commonly referred to as the Long Depression, running from 1873-1896, from which the Gilded Age derived its name? Hardly!!
The tremendous consolidation of industry during this period was abetted by massive government intervention - through the extermination if indigenous inhabitants and the resulting Homestead Act, through war and conquest of the whole continent, and through protectionist measures like the Morrill Tariff.
Free markets have never existed. The illusion that they have is what keeps the system robbing, raping and pillaging with unencumbered arrogance.
It explains why idiots like Ayn Rand, who wouldn't know economic history if it smacked her upside her ignorant face, has a following in business schools that shun history like the plague.
You might want to study history, rather than wikipedia it. The period of 1870 to 1890 was not a depression. It is often described as such because the nation experienced deflation. The bankers would love to keep that association in your mind, but it is untrue.
Deflation is a condition that profits workers, savers and people on a fixed income. It encourages capital formation and thus production and employment. So, if you get a real book on the period, try Murray Rothbards, "A History of Money and Banking in the United States", consumer prices and wages fell 30% during the last decades of the Greenbacks (fiat currency and by falling in tandem- no loss to the workers) but prices continued to fall in the next decade as WAGES ROSE BY 23%. The best tandem two decade result in our history.
Yes, free markets never existed in totality, but during this time, markets were more free than at any other time. The coming intervention by government (socialism) would put an end to it and result in the coup 'dtat that is the FED.
The illusion of free markets is the ignorance of the people, whom have failed to acquire an economic education of any significance. They believe their masters. If you take the time to study, you might stop whining and do something about it.
You equate the fate of monopolists with the fate of the nation. Not uncommon for a follower of Rothbard, the capitalist lackey and apologist.
The period was great for Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Morgan, no doubt. They scooped up all sorts of stuff really cheap after the crash of 1873. For the people, though (whom you care nothing about), they were crushed.
Which is why there was a nationwide rail strike in 1877 and again in 1886 - both times, it should be said, the government came in to kill on behalf of Wall Street and big business.
It was equally bad for farmers, leading to the famous "Cross of Gold" speech in 1896.
Of course the horrible economic conditions for working people explain the emergence of organized labor and the Progressive movement, both ideas that the fake-free-marketeers at Zero Hedge want to flush down the memory hole.
Meanwhile, indigenous people were massacred and Blacks were hung from trees to satisfy the needs and interests of big business. Same as it ever was, on that front!
I did not mention the robber barons of the 1880's. So, try your to replace your insult style with real debate. The people were not crushed, I sued sources- you throw out opinion.
The farmers cross of gold speech had to do with silver politics- they wanted to expand the money supply (this is banker incitement- not everyday farmers). This is not capitalism- it's monetarism.
The labor movements were an attempt to cement their gains and were attacked by government troops- socialism in action.
The slaughter of indigenous peoples were a function of the government's unwillingness to uphold their own constitution and natural rights. Again, socialism in action.
You don't seem to realize that capitalism and free markets require only enough power to protect private property. It is socialism that is the source of tyranny, it is merchantilism that is a source of tyranny.
Please take the time to understand political economy before you write about it.
I didn't come up with the name "Long Depression" to describe that glorious period about which you speak, incidentally.
Anyone who's taken American History 101 in college learns about it.
My point exactly, if you believe what you are given, how will you ever know the truth. Colleges were devised by the elites to give you a particular education- not a complete one.
I have multiple degrees, but my greatest education happened once I had left those hallowed halls.
Obviously you didn't get that education on a farm or working for a wage.
Started working when I was twelve (44 Years) and I have gained much working on a farm as well. Perhaps much which is obvious to you might require a little more investigation.
Those are all great stories, right out of the public school text book. You get an A, dwtb, and your teachers are all very proud of you.
That aside, do you doubt that Sean7k's statement that deflation benefits those on fixed income, is true? Imagine if we had deflation today. Do you doubt that would help with capital accumulation as well as help folks on fixed incomes survive?
(hint: you won't find the answer in a public school text book)
Hmm, yes, I seem to recall that the creation of the Fed in 1913 was A Good Thing, too, according to American Economics 101.
Maybe you need to skip ahead of the undergrad 101 brainwashing and start doing some post-grad research..
this is all fucking irrelevant.
We ALL rode an energy supply wave and the "system" we used really was immaterial. Prosperity came irrespective of it.
Now that energy supply has appeared to inflect, we are seeing that nothing seems to really work anymore. We founder in vain, failing to see that our notion of what CAUSED the present was really logically fallacious.
Our human constructs of commerce and interrelation have no bearing whatsoever on the rate that the earth will yield oil to us. If the sun were to dim substantially tomorrow, would it really matter if we were communists or capitalists?
We are facing REAL systemic headroom here, not a crisis of humans except that we failed to plan. We really are not so far removed from the Easter Island experience; we only believe ourselves to be.
Look around you - do you really see any broader enlightenment out there? Or is it really just a cargo cult with flashier merchandise?
They could stop pumping oil tomorrow and exchange would continue. There was exchange and world trade before the discovery of oil. Oil is a passing fancy. Economics and political science are forever.
Yes, I see an enlightenment because of the freedom of information. Can't help it, I'm a bit of an optimist when it concerns the human condition. I also see the potential for a huge reset and revolution that will cause incredible human misery and displacement. Then, after, a period of growth.
Regardless of what I see, there is today. I have to make today better than yesterday. I can't control oil, I can't control government, I can't control circumstance, but I can control what I do each day- and that will have to be enough.
You are a moron without parallel. Your presence on the internet is a crime against humanity.
Log off. For the children -- who may never ride in an airplane whose fares will rise to $80,000 per round trip Washington to Boston because of oil scarcity -- not dollar value erosion.
What you do today is waste bandwidth. Log off.
douche.
They could take Amtrak instead.
Hmm...I checked for a duplicate post bc I saw ZH spit me a 503, but it wasn't here; now it is.
I'm glad too because it has blessed me with this nugget of idiocy in the form of your reply, which, I must say, is easily the most refreshingly stupid thing I've read in a quite awhile.
Oil is a passing "fancy"? Political science is forever? JFC, lemme guess, a polysci and econ major? Two fucking PSEUDOsciences?
The problem is that you do not understand that physics matter and your stupid "human element" is largely impotent. Energy matters. Nothing moves, none of your precious goddamn "information" gets created without it. The study of physics is a study of work, the basic term engineers use for energy. There is nothing that happens without work, literally nothing.
A period of growth, you say? When does growth END? To an economist, "never." To a polysci guy..."duh. wha?" All the effing strenuous wishing never made the trees grow back on Easter Island. All the sacrifices to gods, all the nonsensical pontifications of shaman like economists and poly"scientists" didn't amount to shit.
Nature bats last.
Let's see moron. Politics and economics have been with us since at least the Sumerians and aren't going away. Oil? 150 years? Passing fancy. Although the use of markets. production and services (economics) is pretty useful in managing the effects of "peak oil".
Who cares about physics if there aren't any humans to participate? While nothing "happens" without work, energy creation does not depend on oil exclusively. I can create energy all day long through work without a drop of oil. I can produce crops without a drop of oil. I can build a home, without a drop of oil. None of these end products will mirror a world where oil is king, but that is a matter of choices- human action- economics.
Life is a pendulum. Societies expand and contract and even disappear. I never said growth had to be continuous. More important, all the energy and work in the world without intelligent direction amounted to a hill of beans (political science).
You're a smart guy Trav, but sometimes, you can't see the forest for the trees.
economics hasn't been with us since the sumerians, douche.
Who cares about politics if there are no humans to participate?
You don't "create" energy through work, energy IS work. Perhaps this discussion would go more smoothly if you take a brief physics course. I'm not going to argue reality with someone who thinks polysci and economics are real fields of study or who resorts to them to brush off real issues as if supply and demand can make the sun shine brighter.
Is oil important to wealth creation? Yes. Obviously.
But wealth creation existed before crude oil came into use. And once oil runs out/becomes prohibitively expensive, wealth creation will continue... though there will be a period of incredibly unpleasant readjustment once our suburbs become uninhabitable.
The question isn't whether oil is important (it is in our current era): it's what is the best, most productive way to organise society so that the most wealth is created, irrespective of whether the energy in that society comes from coal, wood, domesticated animals, crude oil, nuclear, wind, etc.
And the system that creates the greatest incentives to create wealth, with the least administrative and parasitic overhead, is the free market. No, not the system we have now, where a tiny percentage of the population has the rights to cream off an enormous proportion of wealth via currency creation and corporate cronyism. If you think we currently have free market capitalism - or even anything remotely resembling it - you don't know what the term means.
The more a government regulates, the more requirement there is for politicians to get industry 'experts' (read: insiders) to advise them on the regulation, and the more incentive is created for big business to attempt regulatory capture. The bigger the trough, the more pigs are going to muscle in to get some.
" I can create energy all day long through work without a drop of oil. I can produce crops without a drop of oil. I can build a home, without a drop of oil. "
Well, if it was all about you then we would be alright. Unfortunately 300 million people can't fell there own trees and saw their lumber by hand.
.
Capitalism is broken; can't be fixed.
When you come up with a better model, advise us.
It worked for 5000yrs, so why is it fucked?.
Because its not Capitalism that failed.
until you allow for at least part of contributions to be privately controlled and invested there is no point; until then its just another government slush fund that steals from working people
sure they can put their money into the other ponzi scheme, the financial markets.
INVESTED???? Exactly WTF does that mean anymore?
to use YOUR own money the way YOU choose
This idea has never made a lick of sense to me. Perhaps my view is too simple-minded, but there seems to be a *huge* logical disconnect in this line of thinking.
You can already use YOUR own money the way YOU choose. That's what most people do with most of their money. They buy stuff, they pay for vacations or education, they keep some in a cookie jar, they give some away...whatever.
Why would any sane person want the government to take money from you for the purpose of forcing you to save it? You can already save it.
Or let's say the government should take money from you to force you to invest it in private for-profit industry--government-mandated 401Ks. (That's a common suggestion.) As if our country is not quite fascist enough yet--THAT'S our problem. It's not nearly enough for government spending to account for 25% of the economy by itself--we need more laws to compel the citizens to support struggling multinational industries.
I mean really. WTF?
1. Stop stealing from it to paper over government deficits.
2. Stop stealing from it to paper over government deficits.
3. Stop stealing from it to paper over government deficits.
4. Stop stealing from it to paper over government deficits.
Agreed!! It started with Reagan and continued to the present
Actually, it started with Vietnam.
One solution is to stop committing genocide against anyone who isn't white on the face of the planet with overpriced toys.
We must suck at that genocide thing. There are a bunch of non-whites left. Are we only in phase one of the plan, or something?
We've just begun to kill!!
And I would say 'we're' pretty good at it.
Not as good as we are at ethnic cleansing, for sure, but one only has so many smallpox laden blankets to give to refugees forced to march cross-continent.
We did kill 3,000,000 Vietnamese with chemical and biological weapons.
Give Uncle Sam some credit. When it comes to killin', few do a better job.
Actually, history tells us that Stalin was much, much better at it. Mao did an outstanding job as well.
Hitler wasn't too shabby for a third-place guy.
Pol Pot did some amazing killing given his limited resources and reach. Pound for pound, he might be "the greatest".
oh jeezus, STFU with this crap.
Where in the fuck are we committing ANY genocide???
The numbers of brown people continue to RISE, moron.
This is a horrible thing, too, because brown people have no heritage of invention or technological progress
No, it started with its Daddy...FDR, and then LBJ really fked us(totally destroyed the Black American society),and has proceeded for the worse since.
Why should the upper middle class be forced to cede even more of their earnings? Many will leave to more prosperous lands and then the government won't earn any revenue from them.
Then they can visit all their manufacturing plants they moved over there
I'd be glad to help them pack, and I'd even schlep them to the airport.
Wait what? Why wouldn't the top priority people be those with no other options AND who have also paid the most into the system?
Essentially when you finish the suggested fix the end result is to acknowledge that all of the SSI tax collected in the past was nothng more than a Federal Income Tax and your way out now is new and additional Federal Income Taxes.
This wont work long term. The reality is that we need to accelerate out internal growth. While we say that we are for free trade without tariffs we have failed to define the word tariff and I suggest that imbeded in the word tarif is currency manipulation which in essence is a tariff.
I suggest that we bite the bullet and begin tariffs to restore jobs in the US along with a process of unwinding the monopolization of labor and capital that has evolved in the US. We need to be competitive on the world stage to some degree of reality.
We are engineering our economy and we all know what will eventually happen as a result of this.
wattman,
Bingo.
This is what caused the Swan Dive to begin with.
We no longer make anything,we consume.
Bring back Mfg, and good blue collar jobs, and it will be a massive positive in the right direction,as a matter of fact if we DO not do this, we surely have NO hope.
Point 3 is utter nonsense. So if I, as a person who worked in the private sector their entire life, saved enough money to guarantee that I can live comfy once I retire while the government confiscated FICA over the entire period of my working life I don't get any of that back. In any place but government fantasy land that would be called theft.
Point 2 is just more fancy class warfare rhetoric.
Just give up, central planning doesn't work. You can't save everyone from themselves. If people can't save themselves I don't see how forcing me to help them is going to make them any better. They'll just continue to squander their lives away only at my expense instead of their own.
Agreed.
Class warfare should only be allowed to go one way, right irishgurl: the banker-gangsters should be allowed to bankrupt all of us, but all of us can't go after the 1% who has declared that they want us all swimming with the fishies.
Seems fair, if you're one of their lackeys.
You are making an inference that does not exist. Nowhere in my statement did I say that the banks should be allowed to scam the people.
Yes, you did. Just not directly.
To behave as though a class warfare isn't already ongoing is the height of silliness and ignorance of the present.
Your entire opinion is based on inferences and interpretation of what I said, which means it's only what you think, not what I think.
I never said class warfare was not happening and I never said that the banks should be allowed to scam the people. Just because you want to take my words and run them through your revisionist and ideological mindset does not make me own them, only you.