Social Security - your thoughts?

#579
#579
McDad said:
DJT has not proposed cuts in SS benefits. He has proposed making SS payments tax free.

Anybody who thinks Reich is worth repeating should carefully reconsider their ability to be rational.
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well, and as always the math just doesn't work out either.

SS tax cut off is for income over 168k
14.7 trillion in income is taxed every year.
the top 5% income taxes has an income of 187,468. so it looks like the bottom for the cut off is probably around the top 6% of income earners don't "pay their fair share". and that looks like its about 10 Trillion of income that doesn't face SS taxes.
6.2% of 10 Trillion is 620 billion.
SS will pay out a total of just north of 1.5 trillion this year.

so even if you double it for the employers contribution you aren't even paying off a single year of SS by taxing the rich their fair share. Reich is straight up lying about 75 years off a single SS taxable wage increase.

now it would make SS balanced for now if we added the taxes on the rest of the SS income, bringing it to around 1.8-1.9 trillion. assuming the US government actually got the total amount. However, we are projected to need more than that 1.9 trillion in a little more than a decade. but the 75 years thing is just straight up BS.

also it ignores that you just took away 620 billion in income from the normal taxable income. so you are stealing from Peter to pay Paul. and assuming none of that income got put away in a safe place somewhere.
 
#581
#581
VOLLeeann said:
View attachment 705535
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Reich is admitting that SS benefits are not being taken from a so called "trust fund" but in fact the money is being taxed away from people who worked for it, from the people that the money rightfully belongs to and given to those who did not work for it.

Robertson, a former chief actuary of SS once pointed out the truth about the so called trust fund:

"And forget about the “trust funds” supposedly accumulating to pay future benefits. Containing only Treasury debt, the funds, Robertson says bluntly, are “stark naked; there is nothing in them that can be used to pay future benefits.” Their only true asset is the government’s ability to collect taxes in the future."

 
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#588
#588
#589
#589
hog88 said:
I wonder if this will apply to congressional pensions?

But either way, they gotta appease the public sector unions.
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I had 6 good earning years in a state system where I paid no SS tax (had mandatory pension contribution). As of now, it impacts my anticipated SS benefit given those 6 years are replaced in the calculations by earnings/contributions from part time jobs in high school and college. Still, I understand that if I didn't pay in I shouldn't get the benefit of being treated as if I did.
 
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#590
#590
more lies about SS being exposed...

--No correlation between taxes paid and benefits received
--SS paid is not saved then paid back to you when you retire, all SS taxes you pay is spent in the year you pay hence SS has always been bankrupt
--SS trust fund is a myth


 
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#591
#591
jmacvols1 said:
more lies about SS being exposed...

--No correlation between taxes paid and benefits received
--SS paid is not saved then paid back to you when you retire, all SS taxes you pay is spent in the year you pay hence SS has always been bankrupt
--SS trust fund is a myth


Click to expand...



^^^ that makes me sick. SS should be optional, if it exists at all. Its not Constitutional, its bullcrap and i will never draw a penny of what has been taken from me every week for 30 years now. SS is a stinkin pyramid scheme that we are FORCED to participate in under the threat of violence and/or incarceration. Complete garbage. The politicians that have stolen from SS with their IOUs should be drawn and quartered. Any which are dead should have an asterisk** next to their name in any government records or textbooks and be permanently discredited.

Another example of Liberal Leftist larceny from ALL of us Americans. The Left has never had a good idea. Failure after failure. Crime after crime. Scheme after scheme to enrich politicians, their friends, and the donors that own them. Washington DC needs an enema to wash out all those POS. Yesterday.
 
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#592
#592
marcusluvsvols said:
^^^ that makes me sick. SS should be optional, if it exists at all. Its not Constitutional, its bullcrap and i will never draw a penny of what has been taken from me every week for 30 years now. SS is a stinkin pyramid scheme that we are FORCED to participate in under the threat of violence and/or incarceration. Complete garbage. The politicians that have stolen from SS with their IOUs should be drawn and quartered. Any which are dead should have an asterisk** next to their name in any government records or textbooks and be permanently discredited.

Another example of Liberal Leftist larceny from ALL of us Americans. The Left has never had a good idea. Failure after failure. Crime after crime. Scheme after scheme to enrich politicians, their friends, and the donors that own them. Washington DC needs an enema to wash out all those POS. Yesterday.
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How about I buy your future SS payments for $1K today?

I’d bet my home and 401K both that SS is NOT going to have some random end date unless the program gets renamed. Way too many of our citizens are terrible with their finances and we would have our streets flooded with old homeless folks without the safety net of SS. Political suicide to try to get that through as law.
 
#593
#593
I realize this thread is really for internet-style argue blubbering, but I was looking at retirement and I logged into SS just this week. I was alone, so I couldn't argue with anybody. I have not run the fancy calculator they have, but there is one. I downloaded it. Maybe I will play with it sometime.

I believe that (no blubbering) SS needs to be pay-as-you-go and there never actually was any trust fund. It has to be pay as you go. Again, I am not interested in the blubbering aspects of it.

According to them, I have paid them $400,000. I presume this is a nominal figure. They owe me about $4000 a month in today's' dollars (not nominal). My wife of course would draw half that if she didn't pay anything, so for us it's $6000 (real not nominal). So really, they are probably collecting enough money for SS. They're gonna lose in nominal dollars, but that's fine. I'm not going to die fast enough for them to win.

Medicare, on the other hand, they are not collecting enough to fund it. According to them, I have paid $110,000 to medicare. I would love to avoid doctors and then die, so maybe they will come out okay, but they would lose hugely on an average person.

For all you that want to point out that my employer also paid, I included that, because to not include it would be stupid. Making stupid statements would just lead to more blubbering. Those of you that are great at math will readily see that nobody who ever lived could have ever paid $400,000 + $400,000 in the SS part of payroll taxes.

As people have had fewer children, SS has to be brought into balance (I believe it has to be pay-as-you-go). Payroll taxes stuck at about 7% + 7%. I am sure there are lots of reasons why its stuck. Payments, of course, could be anything. There's no yardstick to measure whether or not they pay you too much. Plenty of yardsticks to determine whether taxes are too high.

It'll be interesting to see if any adult supervision ever shows up in Washington to talk about that in a non-blubbering way.
 
#594
#594
A couple million SS beneficiaries were removed by COVID and millions more probably won’t live as long from vaccinations and having had COVID. So the SS deficit won’t be as difficult to erase. If the savings wasn’t being spent on other ****.
 
#595
#595
Firebirdparts said:
I realize this thread is really for internet-style argue blubbering, but I was looking at retirement and I logged into SS just this week. I was alone, so I couldn't argue with anybody. I have not run the fancy calculator they have, but there is one. I downloaded it. Maybe I will play with it sometime.

I believe that (no blubbering) SS needs to be pay-as-you-go and there never actually was any trust fund. It has to be pay as you go. Again, I am not interested in the blubbering aspects of it.

According to them, I have paid them $400,000. I presume this is a nominal figure. They owe me about $4000 a month in today's' dollars (not nominal). My wife of course would draw half that if she didn't pay anything, so for us it's $6000 (real not nominal). So really, they are probably collecting enough money for SS. They're gonna lose in nominal dollars, but that's fine. I'm not going to die fast enough for them to win.

Medicare, on the other hand, they are not collecting enough to fund it. According to them, I have paid $110,000 to medicare. I would love to avoid doctors and then die, so maybe they will come out okay, but they would lose hugely on an average person.

For all you that want to point out that my employer also paid, I included that, because to not include it would be stupid. Making stupid statements would just lead to more blubbering. Those of you that are great at math will readily see that nobody who ever lived could have ever paid $400,000 + $400,000 in the SS part of payroll taxes.

As people have had fewer children, SS has to be brought into balance (I believe it has to be pay-as-you-go). Payroll taxes stuck at about 7% + 7%. I am sure there are lots of reasons why its stuck. Payments, of course, could be anything. There's no yardstick to measure whether or not they pay you too much. Plenty of yardsticks to determine whether taxes are too high.

It'll be interesting to see if any adult supervision ever shows up in Washington to talk about that in a non-blubbering way.
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One of the best ways to bring it into balance is to eliminate payouts to folks who don’t pay in such as the non working spousal benefit. This isn’t a death benefit that keeps your payments coming after your death. Why should you get $6K a month instead of $4K just because you have a wife who chose not to work outside the home and contribute to the fund? Another guy who made equal contributions as you only gets $4K because his spouse also contributed to the fund and earned her own benefit? Makes zero sense to me.

Also, every defined benefit retirement plan I’ve ever seen has the option to choose for your annuity to continue after your death to your spouse, but it’s a lower monthly payout for the entirety of the annuity. If you want to select a death benefit for your SS, then your $4K should be something closer to $3K monthly in order for it to continue after your death.

They also raiding the program to offer disability to folks who have not earned a benefit through contributions?

It’s such a messed up “retirement” system - no wonder it’s always being discussed. Change the system to follow the norms of other defined retirement benefit programs and it will change the narrative quickly.
 
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#596
#596
marcusluvsvols said:
^^^ that makes me sick. SS should be optional, if it exists at all. Its not Constitutional, its bullcrap and i will never draw a penny of what has been taken from me every week for 30 years now. SS is a stinkin pyramid scheme that we are FORCED to participate in under the threat of violence and/or incarceration. Complete garbage. The politicians that have stolen from SS with their IOUs should be drawn and quartered. Any which are dead should have an asterisk** next to their name in any government records or textbooks and be permanently discredited.

Another example of Liberal Leftist larceny from ALL of us Americans. The Left has never had a good idea. Failure after failure. Crime after crime. Scheme after scheme to enrich politicians, their friends, and the donors that own them. Washington DC needs an enema to wash out all those POS. Yesterday.
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if Trump gets rid of the IRS and federal taxes, I guess that will end SS taxes. Too late for me but it would be the best thing for young people just starting out in their working career.
 
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#597
#597
Thunder Good-Oil said:
A couple million SS beneficiaries were removed by COVID and millions more probably won’t live as long from vaccinations and having had COVID. So the SS deficit won’t be as difficult to erase. If the savings wasn’t being spent on other ****.
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Its difficult to tell at a quick glance, but total payroll in the US was pretty much stagnant from 2019 to 2020, 8.8 trillion to 8.9 trillion. not sure when inflation gets factored, but that is a pretty null gain. so income didn't go up.

again, couldn't find a better breakdown in 2 minutes of googling: but 1.2 million people died from Covid, couldn't find a per year break down with ages attached but it was 1 million seniors who died total. so 333k per the 3 years. we retired 4.1 million in 2020 alone (vs about 2.4), that was almost 2 million more people leaving the work force than normal.

so any "gains" in SS would be offset by higher than normal retirements, both as more people drawing, as well as less income. 2 million more may not sound like a lot, but those were the highest earners who decided to retire instead of put up with more bs.

I doubt Covid is going to do any type of balancing. IIRC the rate of death in seniors went from about 1.85% to 1.97% during the peak of Covid. I don't think 0.12% more dead offsets all the additional retired.
 
#598
#598
LouderVol said:
Its difficult to tell at a quick glance, but total payroll in the US was pretty much stagnant from 2019 to 2020, 8.8 trillion to 8.9 trillion. not sure when inflation gets factored, but that is a pretty null gain. so income didn't go up.

again, couldn't find a better breakdown in 2 minutes of googling: but 1.2 million people died from Covid, couldn't find a per year break down with ages attached but it was 1 million seniors who died total. so 333k per the 3 years. we retired 4.1 million in 2020 alone (vs about 2.4), that was almost 2 million more people leaving the work force than normal.

so any "gains" in SS would be offset by higher than normal retirements, both as more people drawing, as well as less income. 2 million more may not sound like a lot, but those were the highest earners who decided to retire instead of put up with more bs.

I doubt Covid is going to do any type of balancing. IIRC the rate of death in seniors went from about 1.85% to 1.97% during the peak of Covid. I don't think 0.12% more dead offsets all the additional retired.
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90% of COVID deaths were 65+. Each one takes 17-20 years of benefits out of the system. I’m not certain, but I don’t think that the 1.21 million includes co-morbidities. So the 1.21 million number could be well understated.

I think that the 2023 SS deficit was around $40 billion. 1 million fewer beneficiaries at $20k each is $20 billion.
 
#599
#599
Thunder Good-Oil said:
90% of COVID deaths were 65+. Each one takes 17-20 years of benefits out of the system. I’m not certain, but I don’t think that the 1.21 million includes co-morbidities. So the 1.21 million number could be well understated.

I think that the 2023 SS deficit was around $40 billion. 1 million fewer beneficiaries at $20k each is $20 billion.
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the 1.21 was total excess deaths, not just Covid 19.

www.cidrap.umn.edu

COVID-19 behind thousands of excess US deaths, analysis shows

www.cidrap.umn.edu www.cidrap.umn.edu

"Overall, 15.8 excess deaths were reported due to non–COVID-19 natural causes for every 100 reported COVID-19 deaths across the study period. A total of 1,194,610 excess natural-cause deaths occurred nationally (90% posterior interval [PI], 1,046,000 to 1,340,204).

A total of 162,886 of these excess natural-cause deaths (90% PI, 14,276 to 308,480) were not reported as COVID-19."
 
#600
#600
LouderVol said:
the 1.21 was total excess deaths, not just Covid 19.

www.cidrap.umn.edu

COVID-19 behind thousands of excess US deaths, analysis shows

www.cidrap.umn.edu www.cidrap.umn.edu

"Overall, 15.8 excess deaths were reported due to non–COVID-19 natural causes for every 100 reported COVID-19 deaths across the study period. A total of 1,194,610 excess natural-cause deaths occurred nationally (90% posterior interval [PI], 1,046,000 to 1,340,204).

A total of 162,886 of these excess natural-cause deaths (90% PI, 14,276 to 308,480) were not reported as COVID-19."
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I looked at the CDC for the # of US COVID deaths and it was 1.21 million. Seems low to me.

COVID was the first one. I expect to see more mystery diseases in our future.
 
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