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On Politics, Social Security and Spine
Assuming that no white knight (aka NJ Gov. Christie) enters the scene for the Republicans, this fall will be a race between Mitt & “O”. I’ve listened to them discuss their views on a hot button of mine, Social Security.
Not surprisingly, both sides have dodged this issue. They say we need adjustments and refer to the “need” to extend the retirement age. They also agree that some adjustments in the Cost-Of-Living (COLA) should be considered. Extending the retirement and COLAs would be implemented over twenty years they claim. These are “kick the can” (far) down the road strategies. Those who are under 50 today would feel the consequences.
You can’t blame the politicians for wanting to duck this issue. There is a monster block of voters (primarily the Boomers) who would love to see a plan for SS that pushed things out by fifteen years. If SS became a real topic in the election, it could potentially throw the vote one way, or the other.
The fact is, the next president will be forced to make major changes at Social Security. Ironically, the Social Security Trust Fund might be responsible for tossing SS into the political debate. An explanation:
Social Security actually consists of two pieces. Old-Age Insurance and Survivors Insurance (OASI) is one part; Disability Insurance (DI) is the other. What Mitt and O are talking about is the Old Age side of the story. This program is not yet falling off a cliff. However, the DI fund is. The question is, “How bad is DI?”
An answer can be found in the 2011 Social Security report to Congress. Ten months ago it said that the DI fund would be exhausted in 2018. This very convenient forecast put the day of reckoning for DI two years outside of the next presidential cycle.
The Intermediate, or base case forecast for the DI Trust Fund:
The next question is, “What’s the SSTF going to say in May 2012 about the new termination date for DI?” The answer depends on whether the folks who write the report for SS have “spine”. If they do, they will say that the Base Case for the DI fund shows it will be exhausted in the fourth quarter of 2016. That would mean that DI benefits would have to be immediately and significantly cut across the board. Those cuts would happen on or about Election Day, 2016.
If the SSTF produces a forecast that puts the death of DI in the 2013-16 cycle, then it is fair game to force the 2012 candidates to put forward their plans for fixing it. The SSTF will probably produce that forecast. If it does, it opens a Pandora’s box on the very big issue of what to do with the (much, much larger) Old Age side of the equation.
My expectation is based on the following: Look again at the SSTF report above . The forecast was that the DI Trust Fund (DITF) fund would end 2017 with a balance of only $7b. This means that the actual “go broke" date was 1/6/2018. (How to Spin a Forecast lesson 101… Gain 6 days, gain a year….)
The first Q 2012 data for the DI funds shows a 7% YoY rise in benefits. This is largely a consequence of the 3.6% COLA increase. (Ben B. maintains this does not exist). The other 3.5% reflects the rising number of folks getting benefits. Tax revenues are behind “schedule” (blame the economy). Finally, interest income is going to be under “budget”. The amount of investable funds is rapidly declining, and interest income on the DITF’s remaining cash is falling with Bernanke’s endless ZIRP.
The 2012 number for the DITF will have to be reduced from last year's estimates by about $5b. This has a multiplier effect, as the COLA re-base repeats itself with every year. The revision for 2012 will add up to more than $20b over the next four years. This minor adjustment will bring the termination date to June of 2017. It's still not close enough to bring the issue onto the 2012 political table. But more adjustments are in order.
The SSTF is stuck with a downbeat economic forecast from the CBO. It can’t have a rosy forecast when its “buds” up the street are saying it isn’t so. Adjusting to the CBO’s dour outlook will knock another seven months off the life of DI.
There are two possible outcomes in the upcoming SSTF report on DI:
A) The DI fund will be exhausted in 2017.
This is the spineless approach as the details will show that the actual date of exhaustion is January of 2017.
B) The DI fund will be exhausted in the 4th quarter of 2016.
That would be “show time”.
By itself the DI problem is solvable. To understand what is going on, look at cash flow. The mumbo-jumbo about Trust Funds is just mumbo-jumbo. The cash flow numbers:
Unless there are changes to the program, the deficits at DI will continue to grow. The long-term, unfunded cost is 0.4 – 0.5% of GDP. That would put the cost of maintaining DI at about 10% of the military, and 5% of the cost for both Medicare and Old Age SS.
In the scheme of things, the problems at DI are small. Other problems are so large in comparison. But a “fix” at DI could add another half-trillion onto the debt/deficit in the decade after it goes broke. That’s not a small number at all.
If Obama is honest, he will acknowledge the problem and propose new taxes to fill the bucket. He will say that America is too rich a country to let disabled workers fall through a crack. He will get votes for that position.
Romney has a problem. He can’t propose higher taxes that would be earmarked to stabilize DI. He will say that DI has to be cut to the point that it becomes Pay-Go without new taxes. He will get votes for that position, but it will expose him to criticism. It will be argued that this is about the 1% versus disabled workers. Obama would have a field day with that position. “O” would be protecting the widows and orphans while Mitt would be keeping the rich, rich.
There must be a fix at DI in the next four years. The next president will guide that resolution through Congress. The “fix” will either socialize the system by diverting tax dollars to it, or the program will be starved. The solution will be a cookie-cutter preliminary version of the much bigger issue of the Retirement Fund. OASI will face a much larger wall in 2017 – 20. What will happen to DI in 2016 will pave the way for what happens to OASI in 2019.
One final chart. This looks at cash flow for DI, OASI and combined SS. We crossed the red-ink line on DI in 2005. OASI went into the red in 2010. Neither fund will ever be in the black again.
Notes:
Both candidates may try to point to fraud and abuse at DI as the problem. There is abuse, lots of it. But if it ended tomorrow, it would not move the needle. The required fix is much larger than the abuse.
Neither candidate wants SS to be an issue. If it becomes one, Obama has more to win and Romney more to lose.
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Amazing to me that there are still people with their head in the sand on this one... Especially here.
They are figuring that inflation will fix this (along with everything else).
Look at that, we have some inflation deniers!
lednbrass - little hard on the folks aren't you? We're all in this mess together. I don't smoke or drink so I didn't waste a lot of money on that; however, I did spend freely on my kids as I'm sure you do. Now we spend on our grandchildren. I still work every day as does my wife. We live below our means; our cars are 11 & 13 years old. We don't take SocSec for granted, but we're hoping to get some of our money back (after paying into it for 45 years). I have to agree with you on some points, especially Medicare. Systems like this say, "fraud me!" My wife and I take all this pretty seriously, so we have walked 3 miles/day for 30 years and/or work-out 4 nights/week. Social responsibility starts with the individual. When we're done at least we can say we didn't steal from or abuse the system and we did our best to keep it in tact for the purposes for which it was intended. Those who can't say that, well, I don't condemn them; but they may condemn themselves.
dontgoforit:
Don't act like you didn't have any warning about what is coming.
I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but a lot of people are going to get a very blunt lesson ON WHY YOU SHOULDN'T TRUST GOVERNMENT.
Hopefully future generations will beat it into submission until it serves them like a broken cur.
In the meantime, you probably have about a year to get ready for what is to come. Better to eat some ramen now so you can afford a little gold than "hope it will all work out and our representatives will do the right thing".
One of my primary concerns in life is the prospects faced by my now teenage son. I have spent on some small things, but he regularly laments that he is the only kid he knows that doesnt have an Xbox or Playstation.
We are now at a time where the mathematics of the situation cannot be avoided. SS and Medicare are adding to the deficit at a rate that can only be sustained by the creation of vast sums from thin air and I am far more worried about the impact on my son then the impact on those who had a lifetime to prepare and squandered it. Im sorry, but I dont see how a massive lack of foresight and planning constitutes on obligation on his part (or mine).
My car is 8, my truck is 22. I have taken 3 vacations that actually involved traveling since my son was born and spent years working 70+ hour weeks. When one job couldnt support my family, I worked two. I am in the process of simply withdrawing from the system as I am tired of being bled, if all works out I will soon own a small lakeside cottage that will be sufficient after repairs. I have gone round and round with my own parents and grandparents on this for 20 years now- I flat out told them long ago that their expectations were skewed, unrealistic, and equivalent to theft. By the same token I am the only child or grandchild who had previously told them all that as long as I draw breath they will have food and a roof- it may not be fancy but it will suffice. If my parents cant afford to live it is MY responsibilty, not that of society.
I can't argue with you. I've done pretty much what you're describing, other than the traveling part. We are not reliant on SS, we are hoping on SS. We've got savings and our place will be paid off, so no debt for us equals flexibility and some financial security. Inflation is the Fed's plan to reduce the cost of the debt. It's gonna hit us hard, I'm afraid - seen it before. But, like all the other times, we'll adjust, adapt and roll with the punches. Good luck to you, bro.
I voted you down for the following:
Make your lazy ass little fucker paint the house, mow the lawn, weed the garden, resurface the driveway, repoint the bricks, repair the fence, pick up the dogshit, WHATEVER, and pay him.
When I was a little fucker, I wanted to buy shit, and didn't have any money. They were talking about painting the house, so I OFFERED to do it (which was over and above the other inputs I made to the family concern), and my parents paid me. I was NOT LAZY, and didn't expect them to give shit to me.
You do your son a HUGE disservice by not putting him to work. Callouses build character.
Hehe, if you only knew.
In the last few weeks he has dug several hundred feet of row and hauled the dirt to put in spinach, mustard greens, onions, carrots, and sugar snaps. He helped me put up the first 150' of trellis for my pole sugar snaps to be replaced by other crops as the year progresses, and will be hand tilling another row today with a cultivator when he gets home from school.
Calluses shmalluses, the boy has blisters. ;-)
I am paying him a little for it but he has elected to start saving for a car. I paid for drivers ed which he just started this past weekend, he has had his learners since his 15th birthday and is now a couple months from 16 so the drivers ed and insurance were part of a deal for getting the ground ready as my back aint what it used to be.
I know what you are saying, and Im on it lol.
WHO THE FUCK VOTED THIS GUY DOWN?
PRAY YOU NEVER RUN INTO ME.
Voted you back up.
You and your boy are the future, if we are to have any!
Have fun!
LednBrass,
It is not my kids problem to furnish you with the lifestyle you feel that you deserve.
Wasn't mine either, but like your kids I PAID, they will pay also.
The lifestyle,benefits we deserve was not set up by us, and we had no control over it just as theft from our pay paid for yours, or your parents..
You paid a far lower percentage on social security and medicare then they will have to, and paid a pittance of what you will likely receive depending on your age. If you think default and a massive overhaul of the system are not on the horizon, I believe you will be very disappointed. Im 45 and on the front end of Gen X, we arent going to see a flipping dime. I have been bled for nothing my whole life, but want it to stop with me.
I dont agree with no control, people just chose to ignore it because they were too busy buying stuff, taking vacations, and generally living the good life for decades and now expect to be maintained by those who will never be able to afford those things in order to perpetuate a prosperity that was largely illusory and based on taking paycheck loans against the earnings of those too young to even vote. LBJ moved SS money into the general fund, and the reaction from the public was nonexistent. There are too many old grasshoppers demanding the blood of too few young ants for sustenance, the math simply does not work.
I personally dont consider the idea that because intergenerational theft has tradition it is viable- we have reached the point where it clearly is not.
Lednbrass,
You paid a far lower percentage on social security and Medicare then they will have to, and paid a pittance of what you will likely receive depending on your age.
ONCE AGAIN......................................let common sense prevail.
Who's FAULT is that?
NOT the Boomers.......the Frigging thieves in Congress.Your issue is not with Boomer's dude.
My parents are from the Depression/WWII era(before they passed),they were paying into SS, a PITTANCE compared to what I was in the 70's-00's.
Did anyone Bitch about that then?,nope.
They were called the greatest Generation.........................we do exactly what they did ,we're shit on a stick.
Get over it. Before all is said and done, NO ONE is going to get DICK.
Only those who are illegals, or never contributed to the system, and the few unfortunates, too infirmed and truly disabled will touch a dime.
We will be EVALUATED for benefits by Net Worth.You saved(as a lot here did/do),your screwed, because you were responsible.
Well, if it means anything I started bitching about it quite vocally in the mid 80's as a college kid when I started seriously digging into the money and demographics. It was quite predictable even then- the writing was on the wall in six foot red letters and Im not Nostradamus. On the good side, many of my family remember this well and I get to look like him though I was too optomistic about when it would go upside down- I pegged 2020.
My issue is only with someone who is willing to demand from my kid's generation what they will not be able to afford. He cant even get hired at most jobs yet- yet will owe several years gross pay to the federal government right out of the starting gate. If he goes to college (he wants an engineering degree, Im trying to talk him into getting certified for machine tools or welding first to have a saleable trade skill which will mesh with that and work his way through as much as possible) , instead of being able to start looking at ways to get a place and start a life he will be completely overrun with debt and on top of that pay for the half of the reitirement of an old person? That isnt life- its serfdom. I do not and will not accept it, and frankly I dont see anything wrong with the pain falling on those who benefitted the most from the system as it has been for the last 70 ish years.
The boomers are a vast number of people and any generalization is inherently going to be inaccurate for some, but those in my generation have a very stark and even brutal choice when it comes to supporting the flow of decreasing financial resources- those ahead of us, or those behind us. There is no longer sufficient excess for anything else; the organ grinder monkey has keeled over, music has ended and we are short a number of chairs. I have to pick between the future and the past, and that can only end one way.
It aint personal.
I'm 63, took SSI the second it was available to me since I don't expect to get much at some point in the future. You know, the bird in the hand and all that. They could cut me off tomorrow and I could not care less. I've prepared. Been self-employed my whole life and the writing has always been on the proverbial wall. My PM stash has been accumulating since 1995 or so. It's such a shame that I lost it all in that tragic boating accident...
Bruce and everybody else,
Why do you keep arguing about this? Hyperinflation is coming, It'll all be over in a few years.
To the fuckers that voted Lednbrass down:
We will eventually sort the eaters from the productive.
But don't worry: You will be supplied with sufficient pet food to meet your daily caloric needs, dry shelter kept at 60 degrees, and clothing enough to meet decency standards.
FUCK YOU.
And to the fuckers that vote ME down: You cocksuckers are going to get EXACTLY what you deserve, and I intend to enjoy EVERY SECOND OF MISERY YOU HAVE BROUGHT UPON YOURSELVES.
Junk away!
...BUT YOU KNOW IT'S COMING FOR YOU, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!
I'm having a blast. Post some more!
There once were some ZH Boomers,
Who hated on a libertarian doomer,
He didn't give one single fuck,
'Cause they're not done rollin' in the suck,
And will check out, not later, but sooner!
+ 10^1776
This ant is shrugging out. Suggest you do the same.
In the process now actually. Waiting for some estimates, with a bit of luck I will soon have a small home for me and the boy that I owe nothing on and will require money only for utilities and a little gas. I'll be selling my surplus fruits and veggies at markets this year (as well as bartering a bit with them for some services) and hope to be entirely able to survive on that by the end of 2013.
Im done, count me out. My goal is to take as little from and put as little into the current system as I can, I am no longer willing to function as another human battery in the matrix.
Don't forget the squirrels. Mmmm. squirrels are good eating. Refer to old re-runs of the "Bevelry Hillbillies" for how to make possum stew.
The old stand-by Joy of Cooking has directions for dressing and preparing squirrels, racoons, opossums and other at hand game. No kidding. I've had the book for years and just this week flipped through those pages.
Watch out there with the raccoon recipes. You are being monitored.
Although I do find squirrel rather tasty.
Shit, if guinea pig is good enough for Peruvians, then those critters 'r good enuf fer me.
Remember "Burn baby, burn!"?
Barter baby, barter!
I got a clogged drain fixed last year for melons and beans. Where I live there are some folks willing to exchange services these days.
In general we are in agreement I think. I have held a range of jobs and recently turned down a fairly well paid return to corporate office monkeyhood that required relocation, its time to simplify and hunker down as I see it. I will technically be poorer then ever in the near future, yet I dont see it as a move down compared to years of being middle class cog 28768 in the corporate gears as I have been in the past.
Even if Im wrong, I still have a very low cost of living in an area with little to no crime so there is always that.
Well, I would have taken the corporate job, lived like a pauper, and bought as much PM, brass, & food as possible (along with a plot of land & a trailer outside the city) so as to extract as much from potential before the system breaks - but I have no idea what the job required, it may not have been worth the trade off.
LOL, the junks on this thread are hysterical to me!
FYI you douchbags: YOU CAN'T MAKE ME WORK TO SUPPORT THIS SYSTEM.
I took care of a twenty-something year old patient the other day who was receiving Social Security benefits on the grounds that he can't attend college because test taking gives him post-traumatic stress. Didn't ever occur to the folks at Social Security that you don't need a college degree to get a job? Apparently not. So I have little doubt in my mind that the Disability Insurance program is lousy at stymieing any potential fraud or abuse.
And you didn't turn him in for fraud, or alert your local news agency?
The system is corrupt, but this smells like bullshit to me.
People exhaust unemployment benefits then apply for a Social Security Disability. As more drop off the back-end of unemployment, the more sign up for Social.
If you think Social is bad, consider Medicare. Year in, year out, the medical rackets boost costs 10-13%. Outside of military, medica is the largest cost in the US economy.
If the government could bring itself to stop subsizing big business -- which uses the funds to ship jobs to China or to automate -- there might be less pressure to put peeps out of work.
What Krasting proposes is ending the subsidies for seniors so they might be kept intact for the auto industry.
How about getting rid of the cars, instead: simply non-remunerative waste.
I know a working age man who just started collecting "Disability" a few months ago. He has a bad personality, so he claimed he needs medication for his "borderline" personality disorder and can't work. Now he collects more than someone who worked and contributed all their life. Go figure.
Disability camps where the disabled would go for care and rehabilitation. My guess 50+% drop in new applications and a recovery to full work capability of 50% currently on disability.
Funniest line in Bruce's post:
If Obama is honest......
I think we know the answer to that one. I believe there is a 100% chance that the SSTF people will be "gotten to" and produce a report based on rosy assumptions such as 4% yoy increase in tax revenues, 250K net new jobs a month, etc. to project that the DI fund will be fine.
The real solution to the DI fund is that maybe half the people getting benefits from it are not truly disabled. There is more fraud in the SS disability program than probably any other govt program with the possible exception of Medicare. A real ballsy solution would be to have everyone re-apply for DI benefits and have a very specific list of conditions that are considered disabled. No more lifetime grants for monthly DI checks for Social Anxiety Disorder or whatever.
Fannie and Freddie and FHA and Sallie losses will dwarf the DI loss by 2018. Henceforth, slicing and dicing government's fiat catastrophies into categories is just an academic exercise .
Please take 20 minutes to watch this video. In my opinion, the narrator is absolutely right: that the elections are fixed and the networks are in on it. If they fixed South Carolina, then they fixed all of them. Very few places have paper ballots anymore – it’s all electronic and literal black box. Remember what Joe Stalin said “I don’t care who casts the votes, only who counts the votes.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OynCgwmD-HM&feature=player_embedded
I dont claim to know the entire state, but dont think SC was rigged. Gingrich certainly got a lot of support here- not because people necessarily love Newt but they loathe Romney and are increasingly angry with the repub establishment.
He was the best monkey wrench candidate at the time, and personally I think it worked out well. If Romney had won the media would have hammered the "its all over" theme and the whole primary charade would have stopped, nobody would pay much attention to the rest. By at least wrecking the party approved successor it at least gave Paul more time and exposure to speak and be heard. I dont think Paul will win and I dont want him to- the inevitable failure looming needs to hang squarely on the necks of the two "parties". He would only be a scapegoated and he is too good a man and his ideas too necessary for the future for that.
Did you watch the video at the link I provided? It is obvious to any thinking person that the election in South Carolina was a total rig job.
I watched half of it, but unfortunately I think you are entirely mistaken and there are some very flawed assumptions there.
I predicted Gingrich as the winner with a much smaller sample size before a single vote was cast- because I understand the culture here and how people think. Any retarded squirrel with a minimal comprehension of SC folks could have predicted it.
Romney was a no go from the start, he is the posterboy for Northeastern Yankee metrosexual squishy types that by their very nature make the hackles rise on much of the population here. Most SC residents range from distrust at best to outright hatred of northerners and particularly Romney types. The state has had a wave of northerners come here in recent years and they congregate in Charleston, Columbia, Greenville, and Hilton Head. This is where Romney gets such support as he has, plus a few straight up establishment repubs. Romney is just the kind of guy many here would like to beat the shit out of, theres no other way to put it- so it wasnt gonna be Mitt.
Santorum was going to get some support here because he is so openly Christian, but he is also a Yankee and a big government pro union type. Those things were gonna cost him, so while he will get some votes he isnt going to go across with the mass of people so it wasnt gonna be him.
Paul wont get much support for the simple reason that his Iran statements killed him, and he didnt hammer states rights nearly as hard as he should have here. Alot of guys in SC just plain like to fight, it is what it is. The military is considered a good career option here and is very popular, and many purposely go into infantry or other combat related fields after joining simply because they are aggressive SOB's who want a scrap and this is true of whites across the south. High school JROTC programs here get a lot of kids. If he had simply stuck to the statement that the Constitution requires a declaration of war by Congress when it comes to the Middle East and he had hit hard on states rights and reducing Federal power, he could have done alot better I think. Anyhow, it wasnt gonna be Paul.
Newt is a carpetbagger, but his time in Congress was in Georgia which is a massive plus here. Though not a southerner or even with southern roots (usually an automatic win for any candidate here) he at least went to Congress from a southern state. He is big government and that hurts, but he did fight a fight against Clinton and kept spending down in those years. The basic fact that Newt will scrap, will shoot from the hip on what he thinks, and doesnt make apologies for whatever brand of Christianity he is affiliated with at the moment make him the obvious choice for most.
The guy who threw away an easy landslide here is Perry. He would have crushed everyone else but his statement on illegals royally angered people and his cowardice on SCV plates in Texas just hammered the nails in the coffin. Nobody would have cared that he sucked in the debates if he didnt sound like such a puss on illegals and said they they should be allowed license plates like chapters in nine other states as a century old non profit organization. The second he made the comment about illegals I knew he was toast here- it is against the law in SC for an illegal to even attend a university that gets a single dime of state money and thats very popular. He really stepped on a rake and knocked himself out- so Newt was next and the obvious winner.
It was quite simple to know that Newt was gonna win before one vote was made- I certainly did.
I do appreciate your thoughtful response. But I think you are missing a very important point: the job of the MSM is to report the results of the election tally, not to predict the final verdict based on voter psychology, preferences, demographics or anything else. With 0.4% of the vote sampled in an exit vote, four candidates and the leader leading by only a modest margin, there is no way that the media could project Gingrich the winner. They didn't have nearly enough datum. And the early results with 1% of votes reported actually contradicted the exit polling data. Logic would dictate that the outcome was uncertain, unless already preordained.
You are asserting:
I agree.
However, the *real* issue is, "How Sure Are You?" (You Bet Your LifeTM)?
The system is designed to *ensure* an outcome, in those cases where the outcome must be ensured. The fact that the button may not be pressed in "every" election is merely an attribute of the theater.
+1
People misunderstand the two-party process in the USA.
The parties have their own arbitrary rules to do whatever they want. And, that's what the parties do (whatever they want), including when it is necessary to break-their-own-rules to get the party's desired outcome (because there literally are no "rules").
Quite literally, the parties themselves are "free-to-associate" institutions that capriciously apply their own "guidelines" to manage their people and public perception. It has nothing to do with "free-and-fair" -- these parties have the sole purpose to win elections. That's what they are trying to do, and there is no authority to correct their behavior if you choose to disagree with their practices.
It's slightly more interesting that media and large institutions find it "advantageous" to "partner" with the parties in the managing-of-the-public, but that's all we are seeing. The cynic would call it "conspiracy", but the pragmatist would call it "a-business-model".
The funniest part is those individuals that find this "unthinkable". Wow. Really? We're playing with money, power, and control. What did you *think* was going to happen? Every possible incentive is to yield a system that works exactly like it does, which is how it is intended to function.
I loved the David Frum article claiming Dr. Paul was "gaming the system" by utilizing his grass-root strengths by focusing his efforts on caucus states, which in effect, "undermined the will of the voters" that had primaries (many of which are "winner take all").
Yep, now merely running an effective campaign is cheating. How dare he get around the gate-keepers!
When was a Ponzi scheme ever fixed by throwing more $$ at it???
Every one of them, until it stopped working...
I may be mistaken but the "deficit" in the OASI is really a deficit in payments to the fund which the government owes 2.7 trillion. A little honesty would be nice. I see this "mistake" committed over and over by those with an agenda. I never see these "agenda" folks say a damn word about military spending which is grossly under stated by government figures or the insanely out of control health care system which is the worst, most expensive system in the world. I would like to see some honesty in owning up to the fact that the Social Security Trust Fund money as spent by government to provide ALL of you with a lower tax bill, funded the wars that Americans continue to support to this day and provide you with services you didn't want to pay for. Like step up to the plate and admit YOUR role in all of this.
And yes, I am one of those retirees who paid into the Social Security system all my life, never made enough to adequately "plan" for retirement and need Social Security to make it as do tens of millions of others.