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Congress Proposes A Chilling Resolution On Social Security
Submitted by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,
On August 14, 1935, President Franklin Roosevelt arrived at his desk to sign the Social Security Act into law.
It had been a contentious legislative process, something like the Obamacare of its day.
Fiscally conservative politicians derided the program for its obvious long-term costs, the massive bureaucracy that it would create, and the huge tax increase that it represented on workers.
But Roosevelt was able to find support, and the law was passed.
And just before signing it, he proudly proclaimed that the law would go down in history “as a protection to future administrations of the Government against the necessity of going deeply into debt to furnish relief to the needy.”
Needless to say, that didn’t happen. Quite the opposite, actually.
Just like most western governments, the US government has gone deeply into debt to fund its social insurance programs.
Officially, the US government is now $18.5 trillion in debt, and Social Security is the biggest financial sinkhole in America.
Social Security’s various trust funds currently hold about $2.7 trillion in total assets; yet the government itself estimates the program’s liabilities to exceed $40 trillion.
And Social Security’s second biggest trust fund, the Disability Insurance fund, will be fully depleted in a matter of weeks.
The trustees who manage these massive funds on behalf of the current and future retirees of America are clearly concerned.
In the 2015 report of the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees they state very plainly:
“Social Security as a whole as well as Medicare cannot sustain projected long-run program costs…”, and that the government should be “giving the public adequate time to prepare.”
Wow.
Now, we always hear politicians say that ‘Social Security is going to be just fine’. So this Board of Trustees must be a bunch of wackos. Who are these guys anyhow?
The Treasury Secretary of the United States of America, as it turns out. Along with the Secretary of Health and Human Services. The Secretary of Labor. Etc.
These are the folks who sign their name to the report saying that Social Security is going bust, and that Congress needs to give people time to prepare.
And prepare they should.
The US Government Accountability Office recently released a report showing that tens of millions of Americans haven’t saved a penny for retirement; and roughly half of Baby Boomers have zero retirement savings.
This means that there’s an overwhelming number of Americans pinning all of their retirement hopes on Social Security.
Bad idea. In a recently proposed resolution, H. Res 488, Congress states point blank that Social Security “was never intended by Congress to be the sole source of retirement income for families.”
Apparently they got the message from the Social Security Trustees and they want to start preparing people for the inevitable truth.
This is no longer some wild conspiracy theory.
The Treasury Secretary is saying it. Congress is saying it. The numbers are screaming it: Social Security is going to fail.
Ultimately this is a just another chapter in the same story– that government cannot be relied on to provide or produce, only to squander and fail.
Sure, their intentions may be noble. But this level of serial incompetence can no longer be trusted, nor should we be foolish enough to believe that some new candidate can fix it.
If you’re in your fifties and beyond, you’re probably going to be OK and at least get 10-15 years of benefits.
If you’re in your 40s and below, you have to be 100% prepared to fend for yourself.
Fortunately you have time to recover. Time to build. And time to learn.
Financial literacy is absolutely critical here, which includes the ability to both generate income and manage money, two things that aren’t taught in the government controlled education system.
You might also consider some lifestyle adjustments, which may include moving abroad where your money can go much, much further.
Ultimately, learning to rely on yourself is no easy task, but it is an incredible opportunity to become more free.
And in doing so, one day you will no longer panic about the decisions being made by incompetent bureaucrats, because you will be the one in control of your own fate.
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Alpo soufflé it is then! Surely Michelle is not allergec to dog food.
Puppy Chow will reign supreme, as teeth aren't required.
Wait, is Larry Bland, Nate Spencer, and Donald Young a wookie too?
Mr. Mutton, it's Michael, not Michelle:
http://beforeitsnews.com/obama/2015/11/obama-admits-his-wife-is-a-transe...
Actually, cat food has gotten ridiculously expensive.
eat moar cat?
i've always throught of medicare and social security as just another wealth confiscation tax that i will never see a dime of. of course i'm right its just when are the lying government shills going to admit it.
They're both forms of Government intervention in the market supressing the cost of Labour. Of course it was never going to end well.
Social Security, and the various forms of government "make work" programs in the 1930's were a response to a perceived threat of communist revolution in America.
Communism in the USSR was only 12 years old when the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began. Many labor leaders and political figures of the left had travelled to the USSR and saw first hand the "Socialist Miracle" - a cleverly crafted showcase put together for western consumption by Uncle Joe Stalin, whose crimes would only come to light some 30 years later.
How real the threat was is debatable, but people took it seriously back then, and the government took full advantage of that fear by first demonizing communist supporters, then by co-opting their agenda.
The Red Scare which one usually associates with the 1950's and McCarthyism had its roots in the early 1900's and by 1920 had become a major factor influencing American politics.
Check it out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Scare
addendum:
also check out the Palmer Raids:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmer_Raids
Compare the tactics used back then to present day government action and you'll see that nothing much has changed in the last 100 years.
" GoodBye, Goodbye will be the cry when the man with the bargains has passed you bye "
Lock, Stock and 2 smoking Barrels
Arrest and jail those politicians who spent it all
Jail? It costs almost eight times the average monthly social security check to keep someone in jail.
OFF with their goddamned heads.
So that would be everybody from 1937, when OASDI started as 2% theft from every paycheck, until...well all the money is gone. The glorious part for the politicians, is by the time the music stops, they have long since been....DEAD
Confiscate all their assets and exile them to the ME.
It is the voters that enable the politicians to keep doing what they do best, lying and spending other people's money. This goes from the local level right up to the top.
Revoke your voter registration and your residence in the XIV Amendment DC construct.
God damn it. When are people going to take their education into their own hands and stop the public school conditioning and endless TV mind capture?
Take back your own power and don't consent to give it up anymore.
Those aren't the kind of minorities fedgov supports, but rather preys upon.
I do get a good chuckle watching the reactions I get when I tell people that "I DO NOT CONSENT." It's like the idea has never crossed their minds before. Might as well be dividing by zero.
since the Fed is printing fiat out of nothing, honest question here:
why doesn't CONgress just mandate the Fed to do a QE-socialsecurity to cover the 40-trillion shortfall? instead of worthless stawks they'd have a worthless gov program on their books so what's the difference when the ussa clearly isn't going to pay back the insane debts already incurred?
Because QE wan't meant to help all of the people only a very small fraction of them that don't need help to begin with. That's why.
It's not like choke-holds can ever be successfully released, huh? All one can do is to keep squeezing, hoping the victim succumbs before they do.
"Got you in a stranglehold, baby. Then I crushed your face!"
+1 for Ted F__ken Nugent!
You should run for office.
That's what the BOJ is doing right now. Let's see how it works out. Kyle hasn't cashed out yet, AFAIK.
Our being robbed constantly to pay for wars being waged by complete psychopaths knows no bounds!! We are merely worker drones and tax cows to be milked until we die.
FUCK OFF!!!
Literally everything comes back to the same thing: the need to arrest the criminals running the BANKRUPT U.S. Corporation. Everything is a fraud. The "income tax" is only required for federal "government" employees and residents of D.C., Guam, and Puerto Rico. Residents of the states are non-resident legal aliens.
Abolish the IRS as it is nothing more than a collection agency for the Banksters and obviously abolish the Federal Reserve.
Good to see someone else that knows his stuff. You are 100% correct but they don't care about laws and legality, they being the IRS and they have goons with guns. Mafia. Just to add some more knowledge to what you stated above. Even the Federal Reserve openly states on their website that Federal Reserve notes, the paper money in your wallet is nothing more than a form of credit. They are IOU's and so are the checks that you are paid with. Guess what the IRS also has clearly stated that Credit is not considered Income.
One thing all should do in my humble view is to file a UCC1 Financing Statement against your strawman. The Banksters were kind enough to establish a strawman for you upon birth. Your Birth Certificate is a security and it is pledged as collateral in that all of your labor and of course taxes act as collateral for the debt of the United States Corporation machine Fed/IMF/IRS Khazarian mafia.
Ghost,
Links to that UCC1 process appreciated!
Hang the userpers!!
RIPS
Obviously not Ghost, but here is what I found.
http://stopthepirates.blogspot.com/2014/04/filing-ucc1-financing-stateme...
Wall St will take SSI before the end of my mother's life, and I fully expect it to be gone for me (either to fund WWIII or bail-ins for Wall St - or both. Probably both).
Warren and Sanders are really the only ones in the Senate trying to save and expand it. Their efforts, while kind, will be futile.
If you needed to be told this then you are a fucking idiot.
who needs SS, when I gots welfare and EBTs...
Looks like I'm gonna need a bigger stack!
Maybe if the US wasn't spending a TRILLION a year on Military adventures we would have more for the citizenry.
Eliminating the cap on Social Security payouts per year would do wonders.
Eliminating the cap just gives CONgress a bigger slush fund. WTFU dude
Cut the military Budget in 1/2 and The Corprate US is solvent but solvencey is the last thing they want for the US of A so that will not happen.
Maybe if the US hadn't spent around $20 trillion on welfare we wouldn't have a $20 trillion debt. Maybe if USGOV only spent money on items specified in the Constitution we, the people, would have more money.
Your suggestion to eliminate the cap on Social Security payouts indicates you are just another socialist puppet. SS should be ended, somehow returning GOV assets to those who have "contributed". GOV needs to shrink by 70%, as a WAG.
GG, maybe if the govt had NOT bailed out the banks...maybe if the govt hadn't spent its fantasy money on war...ebt & ssi keeps the sheeple quiet. end the fed, arrest the bankers, jettison the dual citizens, go back to gold. then begin to set the rest to right. not in my life.
"Eliminating the cap on Social Security payouts per year would do wonders"
Let me guess - you earn less than $118,500 - the max income subject to tax.
Pretty easy to support solutions that take from other people - how about we raise the tax rate on your income by 10% - you support that?
Like it or not, it is the likely solution.
There are approximately 59 million receiving monthly Social Security benefits vs. roughly 9 million workers that make over $118,500 annually.
You will be outvoted by around 6 to 1.
Which lets the cat out of the bag that SS is just welfare -
The people that legislate will all make over the limit when they leave office - you really think these mother fuckers will vote to taxes themselves at a higher rate?
BTW it is more like 600 to 1 people making over $118K VS not -
Voting yourself a raise by using the ballot box - what could go wrong?
Oh it is welfare, just more socially acceptable.
Thing is the system is broken. I've advocated for guaranteed basic income. Not because dependency is good, just because it would be so much more efficient cutting the same check to everyone on the dole instead of administrating so many different programs and agencies.
" I've advocated for guaranteed basic income"
Then you are the dumbest mother fucking asshole POS that has ever responded to one of my posts
Go kill yourself before you have kids - do the world a favor.
"Maybe if the US wasn't spending a TRILLION a year on Military adventures"
Don't kid yourself - Europe and Japan spend a pittance on military adventures, and they are much deeper in the hole than the USA.
US society seems to have plenty of money for certain activities, but cannot sustain the SS trust fund (run a surplus for decades) or Medicare, which every worker on the books pays for. US taxpayers have (and continue) spending $ trillions on wars, now extending from the Levant, to Caspian Basin, Persian Gulf, China Sea (Obama’s Asia Pivot), Indian Ocean, Horn of Africa (war in Yemen), the Maghreb and Eastern Europe and Russian border. An added bonus has been the creation of ISIS/ISIL/Daesh, which requires $ billions more from taxpayers to (depending on the day) either fight or support these terrorist groups. Since the financial crash of 2008, US taxpayers have shelled out $ trillions more for Wall St bank bailouts, which has provided a near endless supply of ultra-cheap money to inflate assets- stocks and trendy real estate in SF, NYC, Boston, etc. In addition, there is an endless supply of money for police, prisons and the rest of the criminal justice system, which not surprisingly, ignores the biggest financial crooks on Wall St.
"US society seems to have plenty of money" ?
Your post is generally insightful, but I'd like to propose that the Federal Government has plenty of money. It's not so clear that other social entities in the USA, that are not funded by the Federal Reserve, are similarly situated.
But free fones for every playapimpndahood.
Have part allocation in an indexed annuity
My mom started working at age 14 and died of cancer in her 60's just so some millenial who feels sad about working minimum wage jobs can collect all her money after they see a shrink and get put on crazy pills!
My mom worked up until the day she died...1 month before her 65th birthday. She never saw a dime of SS.
Lyndon Johnson, President who wnet to full scale war in Vietnam, also was the president who asked and got authority to loot the Social Security Trust Fund Surplus for war and social welfare expenses, in return, the Social Security Trust fund was robbed and replaced with T-Bills, [i.e. nothing but taxpayer IOUs].
So lets be clear. Americans paid in full and in massive surplus to fund SS in total. Then it was looted and replaced with IOU's, thus forcing tax payers to pay taxes to make good the T-Bills, and THUS force Americans to fund SS TWICE! Yes folks, we are forced to pay double to fund what was fully funded and in massive surplus.
T-Bills replaced cold hard cash. This was our money, The surplus should have been put into gold, and held for us, the ones who paid.
Instead, SS money paid for Rolling Thunder, the bombing of North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Lyndon B. Johnson started it, all predidents after continued the looting for the Cold War.
Lyndon Johnson was the worst president in US history. If Nixon hadn't succeeded him, it would be obvious.
I would agree with you if his chief competitor for that distinction wasn't sitting in the oval office.
I'll see your Lyndon Johnson, and raise you,
FDR (New Deal, WWII), Woodrow Wilson (Federal Reserve, Federal Income Tax, WWI, and UN precursor League of Nations) and Abraham Lincoln (US Civil War, destruction of states rights, forcibly ended the social contract that was the US Constitution)
LBJ was bad, but those 3 were worse...and let's not forget Teddy.
I agree, although they are all just facilitators, not the actual boogeymen.
A good point. People don't appreciate how much of the rot originated in the Wilson administration. People talk about how Obama wants to re-enact the FDR administration, but a lot of FDR's new-dealers were formerly of the Wilson administration.
Otherwise it would be fine, including the demographic bulge? (babyboom and bust)
You're delirious.
Worse yet, they aren't even real T-Bills, so SS can't go selling them to some other sucker.
We are the sucker of last resort.
There are $4 trillion in IOUs in the SS "trust fund"
I don't agree that spending the money and replacing it with IOUs was a good idea - but the SS fund has $40 trillion in unfunded liabilities.
When studies are done - and reports issued by the trustees they count the IOUs like they are cash in the bank
SS has never been - would not have been even if the funds paid in were not spent and will never be fully funded - your statement is just flat out wrong.
$4 trillion taken out doesn't offset a $40 trillion unfunded liability. In fact without using the $4 trillion in IOUs the real unfunded anmount is $44 trillion.
Sorry Jack,
You are more than 20 years too late.
It was done by Congress on the petition of Treasury Secretary Henry Morganthau in 1939.
"Section 201 of the Social Security Act, “Old-Age Reserve Account,” was replaced by a new Section 201, “Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund.” The only substantial change was elimination of the transfer of revenues from the Treasury’s general fund via specific annual appropriation to the Reserve Account. Instead, a sum equivalent to the Social Security taxes received and put into the Treasury “is hereby appropriated” to the Trust Fund for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1941, “and for each fiscal year thereafter”—that is, automatically."
“Financial literacy is absolutely critical here, which includes the ability to both generate income and manage money, two things that aren’t taught in the government controlled education system.”
Social Security Pumps $2 into the economy for every dollar spent:
http://www.truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/social-security-pumps-$2-into-us-economy-for-every-benefit-dollar-spent/18268-social-security-pumps-$2-into-us-economy-for-every-benefit-dollar-spent
Social Security spend obeys Say’s law of circular flow. It is spent into retirees; said retirees spend on American made consumption goods, such as food, housing, furniture. That money enters economy and generates further activity. Ultimately, it is taxed out of economy and then re-spent.
So, where is the real problem?
The economy is not circular flow as in Say’s law. It is better seen as two loops, where the second loop drains the first. First loop is circular flow, second loop is parasitic losses.
The drain is to parasitic finance. Government that borrows from banks for the credit of its people then siphons away that money upon loan payback, and hence credit is no longer in circular flow.
Other drains are to Rents, which is unproductive activity. For example, during housing bubble, flipping homes was considered GDP increases, but actual housing stock did not increase in proportion to the activity. Swapping and flipping homes was just heat and waste, which drove up prices – more waste.
Paying usury, or rents on money is a huge drain away from Say’s law. Creating money upon hypothecation with keyboard entries in no way should generate mortgage levels of debt usury. (Several hundred thousands of dollars of usury on a home for keyboard activity, really? It is great to be the king an siphon away a free lunch from the real transaction economy.)
Or, going to a Dr.’s office, where an army of insurance bureaucrats shovel papers at an army of secretaries. It is heat and waste. Losses.
Other drains are into MIC, which has some 800 overseas military bases. Dollars diverted to MIC are dollars not spent on improved standard of living or real GDP activity. Some military activity is required for security, but 800 military bases are obviously excessive.
Paying government to engage in activity where they don’t belong is waste.
Government belongs in inelastic markets, and there they are the lowest cost producer.
By demeaning government as if all of its activities are bad, is a form of hypnotic suggestion that overturns reality. Government is required to tax away rents, and to engage in inelastic markets. Otherwise, true low cost economy is impossible. A government subordinated to money powers, money powers who have engaged in theft, to then take over government is a dynamic not captured in this article.
(U.S. government is subordinated to MIC, Banksters, AIPAC, and Extraction Industries such as Oil - all of these groups are rent seekers who siphon from circular flow)
Without a low cost economy, then people are turned into wage or debt slaves. Working extra hard to divert your output to the rent seekers, means you don’t have the energy or time to observe their thefts/rents.
Um, if the surplus was taken away, how can we still pay for the current beneficiaries and all of the people who receive benefits who NEVER, EVER PAID INTO THE SYSTEM? Just asking, because that is what I was told how "Social Security" was supposed to work. At least from the screaming mimi old people. Oh and one more question. Since you have paid into the "Insurance fund", how much money are you supposed to get back from it? Let's say you retire at the age of sixty-five and start to collect benefits. You live until the age of one thousand years, you will collect nine hundred and thirty-five years of benefits. Is that the way the system is supposed to work?
The system has evolved to force a hand to mouth existence on the populace. I believe we are going to need more than time to prepare for something different.
I'm not sure one can adequately prepare for the massive herd thinning event called thermonuclear war. I suspect It will be instantiated as soon as the elites can no longer hide the fact they have pillaged and plundered the working class. Otherwise you will see an uprising like it has never been seen before which will probably have more or less the same effect.
Start taking it out of current recipients or I want my money back from the last 20 years in full.
you sound like me, twenty years ago... it just doesn't work that way.
So when it does finally fail, will FICA go away? I bet $100 it doesn't.
FICA = Federal Insurance Contributions Act. According to Justice Roberts, insurance is mandatory if .GOV decides it is. Besides, it's a contribution, not a tax. Why should it go away?
I'm sure you now feel better, knowing that you're "contributing" to your own financial rape.
FICA go away? LOL.
I want all the hair I have lost over the last 20 years back too
I lost a lot of hair but I found it growing on my back. So good deal.
when one steels themselves to the fact it ain't gonna be there when you earned it,then the story does not have the desired stinging effect
nice try,but i have resolved myself to this fate already
it's called reality when reading the writing on the wall for quite some time
and that is why i took retirement and the cash as soon as i turned 62.. Get something back before it is to late.
btw what in the finance world right now is not a ponzi
the mfer's will find a way to claw it back. they always do.
16 months to go here......bastards
Gold Bitchez.....I pick up pennies
I p[ick up pennies, too. But I only keep the old copper ones. Need I say that there are few keepers these days?
I might be willing to just forget all the money I have paid in and will never see if they would just stop taxing me. Let me put that money into something and plan for myself. I bet I would be much better off long term.
"I bet I would be much better off long term." You're correct, but you're just being selfish. Clearly you are one of those dastardly Republicans that want to end SS and starve granny and throw her out into the street. Remember when Gingrich wanted an alternative to Medicare, one that people could voluntarily choose over Medicare? He said he wanted to see Medicare wither on the vine, and was crucified by the Democrats for hating the elderly. You're much safer when you're (at least partially) dependent on .GOV for your well-being. (Safer for whom is worth exploring.)
Since we're delving into fantasy land, mine is that all my FICA taxes (including the employer match) had been put into gold. All those years with gold at $35 or $42, or even $300 or thereabouts. Some years I would have accumulated 25 or 30 ounces! But of course the government knows better than I how to take care of me.
'...and starve granny and throw her out into the street. '
Granny had some good years.
I listened to an economist consultant recently making a presentation where I work.
he told us the next decade would show that Wall Street will lose its power over the government in favor of the growing retiree population as they would be putting very severe pressure on the government to maintain existing pension and other retirement benefits as not nearly enough money had been put into these programs.
I just kept quiet.
This is the easiest problem the country faces to fix. One change and done the tax goes all the way up, it doesnt stop at 120K anymore. Means test it or eliminate it for any body making over today cap. Aso tax and means test applied to any kind of indirect compensation, e.g. stock options, etc .
So once again more government cheese to those who chose not to earn a good living...
"Prepare". :D Lots of rope to buy.
Every year 8% of my salary with an 8% match by the company goes into social security. That works up to the cap. Why it stops at a cap I do not know because those who make the most can also afford to pay the most. Maybe the reason is to put a cap on benefits.
Government employees do not contribute to Social Security. This is bad because the government has seemingly been taking a greater and greater percentage of the working age population and taking them out of the Social Security contribution pool. Instead, they get their own pension fund that is funded directly from taxpayer dollars and debt.
IMO, what should break first? The first thing that should break is the government pension plans. The government is most responsible for creating the shortfall and so they should be hurt first, starting from the top down ... and based on their ability to affect spending, debt accumulation, the economy and inflation.
The Fed is not part of the government but really its pension plans should be affected first, even before the president ... so, the order:
The Federal Reserve Bank
POTUS and his Staff
Congress and their Staffs
Federal Courts and their Staffs
Federal Government Agencies
State Governments
If Social Security runs dry, then the Fed pensions are tapped. If that is not enough then POTUS and his staff, if that is not enough then Congress and their staffs ... and so on until there is enough money for the least capable of defending themselves and determining their own future.
Of course those who cause the problems are NEVER held account for their actions in this upside down world. They instead blame the victims of their corruption and incompetence... and because they have the power of guns behind them, they get away with it.
US govt. debt.
220 TRILLION
Prof. L. Kotlikoff
Who cares? Work until you dont want to any more. Throw a brick through the post office window, get club fed three meals and a cot per day plus free medical care for 10-15 years, repeat as needed...
i especially like to look at my monthly benefits statement, and then compare it to how much i've paid in (in addition to my employer).
Funny, assuming i retire at 63 and live a reasonable life expectancy of 83, i'll get back about half of what i've put in. awesome. now there's a fucking investment plan i can count on!
Now, calculate it again using purchasing power, and tell me what you've won. :)
I never even open those statements.
No problem creating $trillions out of thin air to bail out banks, foreign and domestic, so why not just print the money to fund SS? Put the obligations on the Fed's balance sheet. Balance sheet too big? Make the banks buy back their shit assets at the price the Fed paid.
Impossible to do.
Money printing is not the production of wealth. It is the transfer of existing wealth from those who produced it to those who did not.
Today there are 156 million people working.
But the government workers aren't doing work that anyone would voluntarily pay for...or they wouldn't be government. Hence they are not rowing our economic boat. They are just along for the ride.
That leaves a remaining 78 million workers to move this nation of 315 million.
Except more than half of those are producing products and services that satisfy the demand only of money-printers and their cronies. The money-printers and cronies didn't produce anything. They simply transfered a portion of the wealth of those who did.
Which means something less than 38 million people are supporting the rest of us.
To print $100, the Government has to go in debt for $100. The Fed takes that $100 debt and puts it on its Asset Sheet. Then the Fed writes a balancing transaction for $100 on its liability sheet. And Voila! $100 has been created.
Except the $100 bond isn't really just $100. It is $100 at a certain interest rate compounded over the life of the bond. $100 at 4% over 30 years is actually $174.
So, to "Pay off" that bond, you need $174, not $100. Except...that bond only created $100. Where does the other $74 come from?????
The answer is they take out a second bond for $174. And then create $174 in currency.
But that means firstly that $74 entered the economy through cronies who did nothing to get it, and who have different spending needs and wants that those who actually produced the wealth.
That means that in that one rollover the economy went from being 100% real to 100/174ths ( 57%) real.
The other 74/174ths exist only due to wealth transfer from the original 100.
At what point does this process of transfer leave too little weath from production to sustain itself?
The answer is:
2008.
It is impossible to print SS into solvency.
We already passed the point where the previous printing crashed the system.
Since that day, they've only been manipulating the maturity date on the bonds backing the currency (and hence the day the crash will be realized) through QE.
Impossible?
It was very possible to "conjure" (if you don't like print) money out of thin air to bail out the TBTF banksters. Did that create wealth? No, of course not.
The Fed can certainly conjure money out of thin air by buying assets with created money.
It's funny how all these fundamental questions of who's going to pay come up when the discussion is about funding mainstreet. For the banksters it's free money, and a free pass on racketeering. For the old folks, it's catfood.
No, that is not what they did.
What they did was overturn "Mark-to-Market" such that defaulted loans were marked as though they were performing.
Then they used those loans to underwrite currency creation.
If you go to the Fed's website you will see that nearly $2 Trillion of them are still there.
Doing more of a destructive thing will not result in other than destruction, any more than breaking two windows will make up for the economic destruction of breaking the first window.
I've been expecting for years now that I would never receive SSI. Trouble is the psychopaths are destroying every other viable investment strategy. It looks like it will be a pretty impoverished retirement.
It's actually getting amusing watching the complete deconstruction of USA Corporation. Someone needs to fire up an "implode-o-meter" to visually keep track of just how many of USA brand Corporation entities are caving in.
"implodometer" im' pla dom' eter Love it!
BS!
With ctl-P they can sustain anything they desire.
The whole/hole monetary system is a big fat lie.
Fiction.
Nothing more.
pensioners from the ussr, are still getting their pensions. the trouble is it's only enough for food.
So, the plan is to impoverish an entire generation of people whose tax money went into social security. Interesting. That should give upwards of about 90 million people nothing to lose. 90 million people with access to weapons, voting booths and materials for IEDs. Throw drones and computers into the mix and this could turn into a very interesting situation indeed.
If you can depend on anything in congress, it's spinelessness. That little crew of wusses will vote to re-allocate money from somewhere back to social security rather than turn a third of the nation into accidental terrorists - bent on finding the nearest politician and/or millionaire and producing... remarkably educational youtube videos for the upper class demographic demonstrating that actions have consequences.
It's more than one generation. It's everyone who isn't a member of the elite and the lickspittle that serve them.
Yeah, some people care about their parents.
Ian 807 - Amurikans are tough talking lardasses who cannot take time away from Kardashian watch to attack those who fucked them. The last words of these buffoons will be " the govment otta fix this " as their blood sugar falls to zero and they flatline. My advice is learn as many marketable skills as possible, stock food, and look after your family. I owe nothing to anyone but my family.
When it became the norm for government to provide anything to voters we the people lost...
Chilling?
Hardly.
If you thought SS was a government-sponsored retirement savings account you are a fool.
I can recall at least three times in the last 40 years when this was LOUDLY debated before Congress...and even twice in a Presidential Election (Reagan, 1984/ Perot 1992)
This might clarify things a bit:
https://youtu.be/mPIVI0CbCmg
Go to minute 2:00.
Except what was a Dollar in 1950 is no longer $.18. Now it is about $.02.
If you believe Government is Godverment, then you will be winning a much-deserved Darwin award.
Very sorry for your suffering. But you did it to yourself even more surely that did the local drug addict (you had decades to see a much-publicized truth).
Yep, saw it for decades. So how the fuck did I do it to myself?
Like a pedestrian in the path of a monstrous truck...
...recognizing the danger of standing in front of the truck is not enough.
You either have to get the truck to stop.
Or failing that get out of the way.
If you did neither, whose fault is it???
I too saw it coming for decades.
But I never thought I would get a dime of SS, and acted as I could to make up for that.
So don't tell a guy who long ago accepted that retirement exists only on the other side of the daisies, how others should do more for you...than you were willing to do for yourself.
Don't blame the messenger for the message.
That too is part of how we got here.
If someone takes your money, mandatorily, and doesn't pay back what they promised, it is not your fault because it was never your choice.
It's that simple.
Whatever you manage to provide forself outside that transaction is another matter.
Please let me know which box to check so I can opt out of having Social Security withheld from my earnings.
Sorry for my tough words.
But this is a life and death issue for millions.
Toughness is called for. As I say this, please realize that the I, too, have paid for decades, and will get nothing. But I accepted that it was a raw deal from the beginning, did what I could to change it, and otherwise took my future into my own hands.
Why did it never occur to you that saving yourself was your job, and not some politician's job to be voted up or down on a ballot?????
In a recently proposed resolution, H. Res 488, Congress states point blank that Social Security “was never intended by Congress to be the sole source of retirement income for families.”
Revisionist history. My grandparents lived pretty well on social security during their retirements. They've been taking the money out of my checks for 30 years and sending me a letter every few years telling me how much I am getting in retirement.
Seems like you just can't rely on the full faith and backing of the US anymore. Shocked.
Old, broke & clinging to a gun…. To bad their religion will dictate they eat shit out of garbage cans, after pawning their guns of course.
The "government" can have as much "money" as it wants. This argument for shitcanning these social programs is bullshit. They simply want the chaos that is coming.
The "United States" is a huge scam.
Absolutely right. I could "fix" social security In one second. Put Congress on it like the rest of us. Put all their retirement funds into the Social Security Trust fund. The suggestion that the program might become underfunded would never come up again.
That might have worked in 1981, before it got so out of hand.
It is far, far too late now.
Reading this is like watching a life-long smoker in his late '60s, with emphysema and an enlarged heart argue that he can make the whole thing go away with an exercise program and by cutting back his habit.
Far, far, too little.
Far, far too late.
Even better, put the congressional staffers' retirement funds into the Social Security Trust fund. The staffers write the bills. Sometimes they write in little surprises too.
Forget the government.
You can print as much "money" as you want.
You just can't make that "money" be worth anything...unless you constrain the amount you print to the amount you produce.
Neither can the government.
Social security will go on. Political suicide to touch it. A loaf of bread may cost $8, but you'll get your $1,200 month.
I'm long millenial tears
I tried "moving abroad" once but the old bitch wouldn't budge.
Hey, wha..what happen to the lockbox? The one Algore talked about?
Federalizing all private retirement accounts will kick the can 20 more years down the road. All they need is a nice market correction to justify it
Printed money cannot save SS.
Only more workers with richer earnings paying in to SS can save SS.
Except you cannot get there with a debt-based fiat currency.
You cannot get there becuase the debt backing the currency must always be rolled over. And in rolling over - just like when you transfer credit card debt to a new credit card, or debt consolidation loan - your new loan includes all the interest that was supposed to be paid on the old one, but now you pay interest on the interest.
So, no matter how much money they print to try and make SS solvent, it wont be solvent.
Because the act of printing the money itself requires an expansion of debt.
In expanding the debt they make the portion of the debt service real economy has to support larger.
In printing the money, they take a greater percentage of the economy away from making things people want and use, and change it to synthetic economy that services the needs and wants of money-printers and cronies.
The part of the economy serving money-printers and cronies is a net loss. It does nothing REAL to support SS. And it CANNOT. Why? Because it is a bubble which exists only because of the money-printing!!!!! It cannot give you anything more than the money printing itself did.
If they try to print their way to SS solvency, they'll only manage to add zeros to all the discussions, while making the economy worse.
Why worse? Because a bigger portion of the economy will exist only to service money-printers and cronies, rather than real needs and wants.
Today we have about 157 MILLION people working to support over 315 Million.
But that is an unrealistically optimistic picture.
Of those, only about 78 Million work outside of government.
Of those less than half (38 million) are working in the non-synthetic economy.
You are asking 38 million people to 100% support the other 277 million.
That is nuts, and will never work.
If you print more, the 38 Million will shrink.
When you find yourself in a hole too deep to climb out of, the first thing you should do is stop digging.
The synthetic economy must crash, so those people can start doing real work.
The government with it's truckloads of regulations must get out of the way, and let it happen.
And the monetary system and banking system, which exists to transfer the risks of an unsustainable banking model onto society at large must be liquidated to the degree they can't stand on their own two feet.
That will be by far the worst economic recession ever recorded.
But while you have two hands and a mind that can work, we can get through it in less than 20 years.
The longer you keep digging, the greater will be the destruction needed to get out.
nice!
Have you no faith in the power of NIRP?
the worst economic recession - is in fact another GREAT DEPRESSION. Government debt that is funded liabilities was declared as $10 trillion, just 8 yers ago. The debt ceiling has now been raised to $19 trillion, and we will probably be there in 1-2 years. When the funded liabilities reach about $20 trillion, at that point the cost of the interest starts becoming significant (and climbing). Yes, social welare programs become impossible. And really other things like space programs, defense programs and all types of handout assistance also become impossible.
other things being equal ... Yes, we are headed towards a global crisis.
"Social Security’s various trust funds currently hold about $2.7 trillion in total assets"
That would be the money the Federle's stole for use in their wars and poverty programs replacing it with worthless bonds.
Always Grandma is the reason for all of the country's woes. Never the forever wars,,, banker bailouts,,, trillion dollar aircraft that can't fly in rain, trillion dollar aircraft carriers that can easily be taken out with missiles, roads and bridges to nowhere, billions for gestapo to spy on everyone, billions more for weapons going to terrorists in a sand pit or given to Mexican drug cartels by the BATFE, trillion dollar 'free' health care, and on and on...
The guy is an idiot.
I am a grandma and am not anyone's problem. My first SS check is scheduled in late December. I doubt I'll ever get back what I paid in, much less what my employers paid in. Although I probably would qualify for an Obamacare credit this year, I won't take it. However, when it comes to the SS that I was forced to pay in, I'll take that and dish out an attitude.
Can you imagine what the velocity of money would be in the USA if the SS checks stopped coming?
Social Security had surpluses until that money was stolen and put into the General Fund. The General Fund needs to put that money back. Problem solved.
Sorry, we got no money,,, it went for tanks, bombers and to support poverty programs to raise the youngins that today are mad about paying it back.
'surpluses'
There never was a surplus.
‘I don't have your money. It's in Tom's future earning power... and Fred's future earning power.’
- Future Fed Chair
‘ Eddie Barzoon, Eddie Barzoon. Hah! Oh, I nursed him through two divorces, a cocaine rehab, and a pregnant receptionist. Heh. God's creature, right? God's special creature? Hah! And I've warned him Kevin, I've warned him every step of the way. Watching him bounce around like a fucking game, like a windup toy! Like 250 pounds of self serving greed on wheels. The next thousand years is right around the corner, Kevin, and Eddie Barzoon-take a good look, because he's the poster child for the next millennium! These people, it's no mystery where they come from. You sharpen the human appetite to the point where it can split atoms with its desire, you build egos the size of cathedrals, fiber-optically connect the world to every eager impulse, grease even the dullest dreams with these dollar-green, gold plated fantasies until every human becomes an aspiring emperor, becomes his own god, and where can you go from there? And as we're scrambling from one deal to the next, who's got his eye on the planet? As the air thickens, the water sours, and even the bees honey takes on the metallic taste of radioactivity. And it just keeps coming, faster and faster. There's no chance to think, to prepare. It's buy futures, sell futures, when there is no future! We got a runaway train boy, we got a billion Eddie Barzoons all jogging into the future. Every one of 'em getting ready to fist-fuck god's ex-planet, lick their fingers clean as they reach out toward their pristine, cybernetic keyboards to total up their billable hours. And then it hits home! You gotta pay your own way, Eddie. It's a little late in the game to buy out now! Your belly's too full, your dick is sore, your eyes are bloodshot, and you're screaming for someone to help! But guess what? There's no one there! You're all alone, Eddie. You're god's special little creature. Maybe it's true, maybe god threw the dice once too often. Maybe he let us all down.’
- John Milton
Ooops!
In reply to Atthelake: Exactly, it is not a mystery that the fascist in government simply stole the money in the Social Security Fund that would have been self-sufficient without the theft of funds.
The bankster/government Washington Empire of Debt, Fraud and Chaos fascist (merger of government with corporate monopoly) have criminally stolen USA treasure and trashed our democracy.
It is time to take the USA back and trash the cabal of fascist in control by acting in our own self-interest.
It would have been self sufficient had the Fed not embarked on ZIRP. Now besides the theft, SS has the same problem as other pension systems. They can't get a decent return on investment to fund future payments.
To atthelake:
Very sorry, but you are incorrect.
See the government's argument in the 1937 SS decisions "Helvering V Davis" HERE:
https://www.ssa.gov/history/supreme1.html
WHICH SAYS:
"The first section of this title creates an account in the United States Treasury to be known as the "Old-Age Reserve Account". Section 201. No present appropriation, however, is made to that account. All that the statute does is to authorize appropriations annually thereafter, beginning with the fiscal year which ends June 30, 1937. How large they shall be is not known in advance. The "amount sufficient as an annual premium" to provide for the required payments is "to be determined on a reserve basis in accordance with accepted actuarial principles, and based upon such tables of mortality as the Secretary of the Treasury shall from time to time adopt, and upon an interest rate of 3 per centum per annum compounded annually." Section 201 (a). Not a dollar goes into the Account by force of the challenged act alone, unaided by acts to follow."
It went into the General Fund from the very first day in 1937. The General Fund then cuts a CHECK OF DISCRETIONARY SIZE (Treasuries) ANNUALLY.
That was part of the original 1935 SS Act.
I stopped reading here.
Officially, the US government is now $18.5 trillion in debt, and Social Security is the biggest financial sinkhole in America.
Social Security’s various trust funds currently hold about $2.7 trillion in total assets; yet the government itself estimates the program’s liabilities to exceed $40 trillion.
Both of the above sentences are incorrect.
Government debt is 98.8 trillion and climbing not 18.5 trillion you need to add in the unfunded liabilities. The next time you do your home budget just leave off food, health care and energy and see how that works officially.
Social security is not a trust fund and has never been a trust fund also it doesn't have 2.7 trillion in assets. Little Timmy Giethner sent a memo from the Treasury to Congress a couple of years ago and told them that SS is having a short fall in payments meaning they GOT NO MONEY BITCHES. So every month since then they have been writing IOU's or you can call them bonds.
Please stop writing bullshit you know nothing about.
Social Security not a trust fund?
From Google "Social Security Trust fund"
"Social Security benefits are paid from the reserves of the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance ( OASDI ) trust fund. The reserves are funded from dedicated tax revenues and interest on accumulated reserve holdings, which are invested in Treasury securities."
Unfunded Liabilities??
An unfunded Liability would be your Mortgage? Seven year car payments? Home Insurance? Do you include those future costs in your present budget?
Or How about Socurity isn't insurance?
FICA:
Federal Insurance Contribution Act.
Your last line pretty well covers it.
No,
If booked properly your job has a lifetime value.
The future value of your loans get booked against that.
What did you think they were doing when the bank looked at your income history and payments balance before giving you a loan?
The difference is that the government does not do that.
They do 'Cash' accounting.
Cash accounting is where your only count bills due this month against income this month...in perpetuity...without ever looking at the cost of the promises made (debts taken).
Using cash accounting for long term obligations is like looking at your whole paycheck as gambling money while in Vegas without thinking about your food or housing budget.
Maybe this help.
SOCIAL SECURITY IS NOT A TRUST FUND OR INSURANCESocial Security is Socialism, not insurance, not a Pension, nor a Trust Fund.
I will explain in another Chapter why your federal government cannot give entitlements to ordinary people. But first, I will convince you that you did not earn any SS benefits and you did not deposit anything into a Trust Fund, you did not earn a Pension, and you did not pay any insurance premium.
In 1937, the Social Security Act was declared unconstitutional because, according to the federal Appellate Court, it was using public funds for private purposes, as a "trust fund" and as "insurance" - Davis v. Boston, 89 F2d 368. The court declared that as an excise tax, which it claimed to be, it could not be imposed on wages since an excise may be placed only on articles of consumption. (This case reversed a lower court's ruling in 17 F. Supp 97, which decided that it was valid as an excise tax). A month later, the Supreme Court, in both Helvering v. Davis, 301 US 619 and in Steward Machine Co. v. Davis 301 US 548, decided on the same day that the Appellate Court was wrong without explaining why the Appellate Court was wrong.
The Supreme Court found that the Appellate Court was wrong to claim that there is a Trust Fund or insurance. THERE IS NO TRUST FUND AND IT IS NOT INSURANCE. The Supreme Court refused to face the question of whether Social Security was an excise tax. They declared: "We find it unnecessary to make a choice between the arguments, and so leave the question open."
That's right! There is no official explanation of why Social Security is constitutional. You are about to learn why, but you won't like it.
By the way, there are some minor Trust Funds for federal worker's compensation, black lung disease, vaccine injury and a few others (these are in the Internal Revenue Code in Sections 9501 to 9510, not in the Social Security Act). Nowhere is there a Trust Fund for old age benefits. Nowhere does the Social Security Act have provisions for a Trust Fund. You can search it all you want, but you won't find it. THE SOCIAL SECURITY ACT HAS NO PROVISIONS FOR A TRUST FUND.
As further proof that there is no Trust Fund or insurance: In 1980 the Supreme Court in Fleming v. Nestor determined that Social Security remains constitutional because there has never been a promise to pay benefits. Again I repeat: SOCIAL SECURITY REMAINS CONSTITUTIONAL BECAUSE THERE IS NO TRUST FUND AND IT IS NOT INSURANCE AND THERE IS NO PROMISE TO PAY BENEFITS.
Allowing your family to partake of Social Security is a sin (1Tim 5:8, Mark 7:9-13). The phrase "worse than an infidel" may seem harsh, but it is in your Bible.
Too bad you aren't as interested in eliminating the Bankster Fraud, the trade treaties, off shoring, and the wars as much as your interested in starving your Grandma.
And how about the EBT and Section 8 housing and other freebies where the participants pay nothing (0, Nada, Zilch) where at least Grandma paid in some tribute.
And what's this constitutional BS. Nothing the government does today is constitutional! DHS,,, NSA,,, NDAA,,, The Federal Reserve,,,Foreign undeclared wars,,,
Better look around dude.
Google? Really.
Another few years and none of this will matter...probably sooner...many of you think life will continue for 20 years? You have more faith than I do...global monetary reset just around the corner and Putin making Obama look like a monkey...22 percent unemployment....20 trillion in debt...global economy in chaos and possible ww3 around the corner..most of population on pharma drugs...gmo....chemtrails..vaccines...hillary as president ...need I go on...
Total claimed FICA income 1.5 trillion annually
Total claimed payments by SSA for their 3 programs 11.9 trillion annually.
Wow you can't see that problem can you. They spend 8 years of income every year.
And these income and payment numbers come from the SSA budget paper for 2016.
When Social security was initiated the average life span was 61. 59 for males and 64 for females. It wasn't supposed to be a pention one would collect for 20 years. If you were born between 1950 and 1960 minimum age should 70, 1960-1970 72 and so on.
I was born in the 60's and knew by the time I was 16 that whatever I put in would never be paid back to me. Even if I do get SS it will be diluted. If I'm lucky enough to make it to 80 at the first sign of a major illness I'm sure they just put me down. There is no way at the current rate of inflation in the healthcare industry that anything will be left.
We can't fight an endless war on everything enriching the few while stealing from the many (Spock in reverse). The MiC, education, big pharma ect. will bankrupt this already bankrupt country within the next 15 years. If the boomers think that on average $300,000 can be spent on them in SS and $200,000 on healthcare they're insane.
according to the government in 2011 $550 billion was spent by medicare, of that $170 billion was for people in the last 6 months of their lives. This is all one has to know to realize that its a racket and unsustainable.
At the end of the day we all know the government already stole 4.5 trillion from SS in the 80's and 90's thus we owe "ourselves" money. It was a tax that the government said we'd get back but just like every other lie, we should all know better.
Its a big PONZI world. Good luck to all of us under the age of 80.
How is it that rebellion only comes up when it's our second amendment rights? The government has stolen from each and every one of us from the day we started working and now it's obvious they've stolen our futures from us. When do we fight people?
These people spent too much of the withheld money. It's gone. Now it's your fault.
Every day it's something. In next year's national selections you will see virtually all incumbents returned to office so they can continue to ruin the country.
This is why we must concede that Americans are the imbeciles of the Earth.
Maybe it's something in the water..
At least we know Paul Ryan ahs our back and will try to impeach Hillary just as Boehner ‘impeached’ Obama.
It’s all good.
SSN is ONLY a Ponzi scheme because the Fed uses the money to cover debt. Yes, there is still an issue of seperating
some forms of early disability payments from SSN. And yes, SSN distributions occur to some who have contributed little to nothing. BUT THE BULK OF THE PROBLEM IS HOW THE FED SPENDS YOUR RETIREMENT SAVINGS.
SSN is ONLY a Ponzi scheme because the Fed uses the money to cover debt. Yes, there is still an issue of seperating
some forms of early disability payments from SSN. And yes, SSN distributions occur to some who have contributed little to nothing. BUT THE BULK OF THE PROBLEM IS HOW THE FED SPENDS YOUR RETIREMENT SAVINGS.
Boomers...thanks again.
Hey, if you want to buy me free health care, groceries, utilities, housing, AND send me a check every month...
Well, I told you not to do it and I'll tell you again.
Don't do it. You'll be sorry.
Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to make a Wal-Mart run before I fire up the RV and head out to Arizona for the season.
Well, blaming the wrong people because they got old is not really bright. You might check out the POTUS you youngins elected twice hoping for free shit and got Obama Care. By the way,,, SS is far less costly then OC.
You better be saving big time since you will most likely get your wish for the elimination of Social Security.
Calculating for about 40 years at around 10% inflation you'll need about 4 million dollars to survive month to month in 2060 assuming you haven't been incinerated by the Neo nazicons by then.