Trying something out

[terryg]

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[i8godzilla]

You knew it was coming.........................

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Touché

[74novaman]

Social security should be ended now. Just because the boomer generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme doesn't mean my generation should pay for their mistake.

[gigag04]

Hello page 63

[sjfcontrol]

Social security should be ended now. Just because the boomer generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme doesn't mean my generation should pay for their mistake.

Suckered? Mistake? I don't remember agreeing to anything. Our parents took it from us -- We take it from you. It's the cycle of life. Cowboy Up!

[SQLGeek]

Social security should be ended now. Just because the boomer generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme doesn't mean my generation should pay for their mistake.

Suckered? Mistake? I don't remember agreeing to anything. Our parents took it from us -- We take it from you. It's the cycle of life. Cowboy Up!

"It's my money and I need it now!"

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[sjfcontrol]

Social security should be ended now. Just because the boomer generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme doesn't mean my generation should pay for their mistake.

Suckered? Mistake? I don't remember agreeing to anything. Our parents took it from us -- We take it from you. It's the cycle of life. Cowboy Up!

"It's my money and I need it now!"

Somehow I don't think he would be willing to help much.

OH, and I forgot -- You'll take it from your kids, too. And they'll snivel and cry just like you're doing. That's the problem with intergenerational Ponzi schemes. Let's see, where did all this start? Oh yeah, FDR.

The first monthly payment was issued on January 31, 1940 to Ida May Fuller of Ludlow, Vermont. In 1937, 1938 and 1939 she paid a total of $24.75 into the Social Security System. Her first check was for $22.54. After her second check, Fuller already had received more than she contributed over the three-year period. She lived to be 100 and collected a total of $22,888.92.[26]

[SQLGeek]

So JG Wentworth is lying to me then?

"Snivel and cry..." somebody woke up cranky this morning.

[sjfcontrol]

So JG Wentworth is lying to me then?

"Snivel and cry..." somebody woke up cranky this morning.

OK, I'll take a deep breath, and try to control my self.
Keep in mind I've had my wages stolen from me since about age 15. Since then, the payments have gotten higher, and the promises have been weakened, and the starting age move higher. During most of that time, I've paid both halves of the tax (which everybody else does too, they just don't see it). It really burns my backside now when somebody suggests that we should end SS now, and that it just sucks to be me.

[74novaman]

So JG Wentworth is lying to me then?

"Snivel and cry..." somebody woke up cranky this morning.

OK, I'll take a deep breath, and try to control my self.
Keep in mind I've had my wages stolen from me since about age 15. Since then, the payments have gotten higher, and the promises have been weakened, and the starting age move higher. During most of that time, I've paid both halves of the tax (which everybody else does too, they just don't see it). It really burns my backside now when somebody suggests that we should end SS now, and that it just sucks to be me.

So you knew you were being stolen from, and didn't do anything about it. And that now justifies stealing from me?

Interesting theory.

Edit to add: If I had to keep paying into this Ponzi scheme, with the full knowledge that I would receive nothing from it(and I won't anyway because SS is failing and by the time I'm retirement age, either hard decisions will have been made or they'll just stop the checks) , but after me my kids would stop being stolen from, I would do it. Just my .02 on the matter.

[sjfcontrol]

So JG Wentworth is lying to me then?

"Snivel and cry..." somebody woke up cranky this morning.

OK, I'll take a deep breath, and try to control my self.
Keep in mind I've had my wages stolen from me since about age 15. Since then, the payments have gotten higher, and the promises have been weakened, and the starting age move higher. During most of that time, I've paid both halves of the tax (which everybody else does too, they just don't see it). It really burns my backside now when somebody suggests that we should end SS now, and that it just sucks to be me.

So you knew you were being stolen from, and didn't do anything about it. And that now justifies stealing from me?

Interesting theory.

Edit to add: If I had to keep paying into this Ponzi scheme, with the full knowledge that I would receive nothing from it(and I won't anyway because SS is failing and by the time I'm retirement age, either hard decisions will have been made or they'll just stop the checks) , but after me my kids would stop being stolen from, I would do it. Just my .02 on the matter.

Umm, and just what do think I could have done about it? I suppose I could have quit my job to avoid the tax, but that's worse. Of course I knew. Just as you know.
I don't know how old you are, but when I was younger, I didn't believe I'd receive any benefits either, and with the same logic you just used. And I would have gladly given up all rights to any benefits, if they'd just stop taking money from my income. They wouldn't accept that deal from me then. They won't accept it from you now.

That's easy to say, at your imagined age. I said that, too. It's different when looking at it from the other end. Trust me. Of course, if your right, then the problem will be solved after you spend most of your life paying into the system (thank you), and receive nothing "because the checks stopped".

[The Annoyed Man]

Social security should be ended now. Just because the boomer generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme doesn't mean my generation should pay for their mistake.

My father's parents' generation got suckered into a Ponzi scheme by FDR. The rest of us were required, by existing law, yourself included, to contribute to it based on a promise made. I will be 59 in a couple of months, just 8 years away from the promise which I have paid into, by law, for all of my working life. I don't have a problem with privatizing social security, but if that is to happen, I want each and every living taxpayer to receive every penny they paid into it refunded to them so that they can then invest it according to their own choices. If that means that some poor person can't have government funded abortions, too bad. If that means that some corporation loses a tax loophole to pay for it, too bad. That fund was supposed to be secured (as in Social Security). Instead, Congress has been treating it as revenue. If they had not done so, the system would not be anywhere near insolvency today. However, the payout is now a lawful obligation of the federal government. If they can't meet that obligation, then something else will have to go so that they can meet it—whether that payout takes the form of monthly retirement income, or whether it takes the form of lump sum payouts to investors so that they can reinvest it more securely.

If you're younger than me, then it is safe to say that I am vested to a larger degree in the outcome of social security reform than you are. That "rob Peter to pay Paul" kind of snarkiness can cut both ways. You don't want to pay into my retirement. Fine. I want all my money back. All of it. I want you to get your money back too, but since I'm a bigger investor than you by virtue of having been in the work place for far longer, I should be ahead of you in the payout line. I'll get mine. If there's any money left, maybe you'll get yours. How do you like that? We're not talking about a bad investment in a private corporation here. We're talking about the full faith and credit of the United States of America. I whole-heartedly agree that SS is a ponzi-scheme. I whole-heartedly agree that the system needs to be reformed. I whole-heartedly agree that reformation should consist of privatizing it. But, I also insist on getting paid back every penny of what I put into it, since I had no legal choice in the matter. Anything less is highway robbery. So, if you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet (which seems to be your POV), better that your, smaller, less valuable egg be broken than my, larger, more valuable egg.

How do you like that?

[The Annoyed Man]

And with that, I fear that we have strayed far off topic, which was.................nothing.....

[74novaman]

That's easy to say, at your imagined age. I said that, too. It's different when looking at it from the other end. Trust me. Of course, if your right, then the problem will be solved after you spend most of your life paying into the system (thank you), and receive nothing "because the checks stopped".

If we do nothing, the checks stopping will be exactly how SS is finally ended. As for doing something about it, of course you couldn't have stopped working. We have to work. Heck, some of us even like it every once and a while. BUT if people had been talking about needing to fix SS 20 or 30 years ago, and then voted accordingly, not joined AARP (one of the biggest obstacles to any sort of SS reform) and written to congress critters making SS an issue, we might have at least had some kind of effort to fix things in a way that would be the least harmful to everyone.

If it would have been tackled 30 years ago, it would have been like treating a broken leg, and setting it without anesthesia. Painful, yes...but necessary for the bone to regrow properly.

Now, I'm afraid its become such a problem that at some point we're going to have to look at cutting off the leg to save the rest of the body, and the excuse of "I was stolen from, so now I get to steal from you" just isn't going to cut it anymore.

As for anyone in my generation, All I can recommend is that we continue trying to fix or disable SS, and make our retirement plans with money invested elsewhere. Because every single person paying in should understand: There is no lockbox. That is not my retirement I'm funding. They're using that money to pay on promises they made to other people.

If SS was a retirement program a private company ran, people would be in jail. I don't understand why govt can get away with Ponzi schemes either.

As for an alternative to SS, I'd like to recommend this plan, if we can't just get govt out of the retirement account business entirely(which is what we should do). : http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/art ... 3906.shtml