Dear Mister Grassley

[KRC]

Which, of course, will never work.  The government is MUCH better at investing than the populous. 

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What was I thinking? They have had such a good track record with investing my money for me. How could I ever compete with their "success?"

[Campy]

The point I have been seeing is that the private accounts will take your money out of the hands of the politicians and put it in your control.

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Which admittedly is better than Bush siphoning 1.4 TRILLION off of Social Security to cover his spending spree...

[KRC]

Which admittedly is better than Bush siphoning 1.4 TRILLION off of Social Security to cover his spending spree...

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Both parties have siphoned off SS to feed their need to spend. Bush is no different then the Reps and Dems before him.

 

SS is going to fail. It was a program destined to fail from the beginning and we are reaping the "benefits" of political mismanagement right now. The only thing not certain is exactly when the program will collapse (the year constantly changes). Fix it now or pay a larger price in the future. My choice: phase it out completely.

 

I want my money in my control, not the control of the politicians.

[Alaska Darin]

Which admittedly is better than Bush siphoning 1.4 TRILLION off of Social Security to cover his spending spree...

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Why limit it to the current administration? This is hardly a new way of doing business.

[UConn James]

Both parties have siphoned off SS to feed their need to spend. Bush is no different then the Reps and Dems before him.

 

My choice: phase it out completely.

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AlGore ran w/ the "SS Lockbox" back in 2000. Criticize him if you want, but he saw the problem and wanted to address it back then. Probably pi--ed off a lot of his fellow Senators who liked to raid it. Would it have worked? Not by itself. Was it genuine? Who knows. But I don't think waking America up to the fact that their money was being stolen by the politicians was a bad thing.

 

I'm w/ you on this one. Why have the gov't take my money so they can repay it to me in 40 years? Wanna know how much they make on interest in a day off of all that money in the macro? I don't really foresee living to retirement age. And basically, the gov't doesn't want you to live past retirement. Better to keep it in our pockets and if they need the money so badly, they can try their best ( ) to justify raising taxes. Keeping it as a silent tax is wrong, nevermind getting taxed on those earnings twice.

[Campy]

Why limit it to the current administration?  This is hardly a new way of doing business.

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No, it's not a new way of doing business.

 

But Bush is the sitting president, he did say "We're going to keep the promise of Social Security and keep the government from raiding the Social Security surplus," and he is much much more thorough at tapping into it than his predecessors.

[KRC]

AlGore ran w/ the "SS Lockbox" back in 2000. Criticize him if you want, but he saw the problem and wanted to address it back then. Probably pi--ed off a lot of his fellow Senators who liked to raid it. Would it have worked? Not by itself. Was it genuine? Who knows. But I don't think waking America up to the fact that their money was being stolen by the politicians was a bad thing.

 

I'm w/ you on this one. Why have the gov't take my money so they can repay it to me in 40 years? Wanna know how much they make on interest in a day off of all that money in the macro? I don't really foresee living to retirement age. And basically, the gov't doesn't want you to live past retirement. Better to keep it in our pockets and if they need the money so badly, they can try their best ( ) to justify raising taxes. Keeping it as a silent tax is wrong, nevermind getting taxed on those earnings twice.

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I do not have the quotes off the top of my head, but I think people have been using SS as a campaign issue since before Gore. It was like Medicare and welfare. Everyone agreed that there is a severe problem and that it needed to be address. It basically amounted to pandering for political points with no actual intention to do anything about it. Bush is actually trying to fix SS. Whether his plan is good or not has yet to be seen, but he has gone farther than just the rhetoric of the previous candidates. Who knows if Gore would have actually tried to impliment the lock box idea. Maybe yes. Maybe no.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

Which admittedly is better than Bush siphoning 1.4 TRILLION off of Social Security to cover his spending spree...

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Actually, for a very long time now Social Security money has been invested into treasuries. There is NO real cash in the Social Security fund, it is entirely US debt vehicles.

 

And there's nothing inherently dishonest about it, either, since a short term treasury bill is from an accounting standpoint equivalent to cash, and what the government is doing isn't "looting Social Security" but "investing in govoernment bonds". It does mean, though, that when the US debt market collapses (i.e. the deficit becomes so high that no one believes the US will pay its bills anymore), Social Security is going to be wiped out. Which makes private accounts unmanaged by the government (rather than invested in US debt by default) look like a good idea, actually...

[Alaska Darin]

AlGore ran w/ the "SS Lockbox" back in 2000. Criticize him if you want, but he saw the problem and wanted to address it back then. Probably pi--ed off a lot of his fellow Senators who liked to raid it. Would it have worked? Not by itself. Was it genuine? Who knows. But I don't think waking America up to the fact that their money was being stolen by the politicians was a bad thing.

 

I'm w/ you on this one. Why have the gov't take my money so they can repay it to me in 40 years? Wanna know how much they make on interest in a day off of all that money in the macro? I don't really foresee living to retirement age. And basically, the gov't doesn't want you to live past retirement. Better to keep it in our pockets and if they need the money so badly, they can try their best ( ) to justify raising taxes. Keeping it as a silent tax is wrong, nevermind getting taxed on those earnings twice.

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Which makes the current Democratic "strategy" of "there's nothing wrong with Social Security" look all that much more disingenuine.

 

Fuggin' politicians.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

Which makes the current Democratic "strategy" of "there's nothing wrong with Social Security" look all that much more disingenuine.

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Or it would, if the voters had attention spans beyond the next commercial break...

[UConn James]

Which makes the current Democratic "strategy" of "there's nothing wrong with Social Security" look all that much more disingenuine.

 

Fuggin' politicians.

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I don't care, just as long as it dies a quick death. A lot of younger people who identify themselves as 'Dems' in the new generation hate SS, and not b/c they can't think ahead (I think on the whole they get really underestimated that way). It's just that while they're social Dems such that people can make their own choices for their own lives, they're fiscally conservative and realize that SS as it stands makes no economic sense. When I think what the Democratic Party will be in 20 years, when that way of thinking changes it from the inside....

[Campy]

Which makes private accounts unmanaged by the government (rather than invested in US debt by default) look like a good idea, actually...

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No argument that it looks like a good idea. But the idea isn't what concerns me, it's the execution.

 

In the new Forbes, even Grassley said that by reducing FICA withholding to 2.2% from 6.2% with the balance going into private accounts is akin to "kicking the can down the road awhile."

 

Grassley then asked the Finance Committee to come up with a recommendation that will prevent future Congressmen from being required to address Social Security in the future.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

No argument that it looks like a good idea.  But the idea isn't what concerns me, it's the execution.

 

In the new Forbes, even Grassley said that by reducing FICA withholding to 2.2% from 6.2% with the balance going into private accounts is akin to "kicking the can down the road awhile." 

 

Grassley then asked the Finance Committee to come up with a recommendation that will prevent future Congressmen from being required to address Social Security in the future.

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I'd prefer, personally, to stop contributing to SS and putting the money towards my own retirement...but then, I'm apparently special because I don't need to run to the government whining "Help me!" when I want something...

 

As for Bush's SS "plan"...I actually find his idea for private accounts highly objectionable, on one simple point: it attempts to mitigate risk and preserve some of the guarantees of the current system by requiring that money in private SS accounts will only be allowed to be invested in government-approved investments. Which means that the government will then be in the business of estimating and validating investment quality...and aside from the obvious and cynical question of "Can they do it right?", there's a very practical matter of having a distinct class of "government approved" investment vehicles that every private investor knows is going to have hundreds of billions of "private Social Security" dollars put into them. Can you say "bubble"? And what happens then when the bubble collapses (as they all inevitably do)?

 

Bush's Social Security plan is like damn near everything else this administration has came up with: fine with me in principle, but egregiously flawed in practice.

[nobody]

it attempts to mitigate risk and preserve some of the guarantees of the current system by requiring that money in private SS accounts will only be allowed to be invested in government-approved investments.

 

 

So perhaps the Bush plan will allow you to personally invest your money in US treasuries?

[KRC]

As for Bush's SS "plan"...I actually find his idea for private accounts highly objectionable, on one simple point: it attempts to mitigate risk and preserve some of the guarantees of the current system by requiring that money in private SS accounts will only be allowed to be invested in government-approved investments. 

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I am against that as well. My guess is that he is tossing a bone to "the electorate is too stupid to manage their own money and need the government to tell them how to invest" crowd. That is the usual argument against private accounts, so my theory is that he is doing this to soothe those concerns. In essence, they are quasi-private accounts since you really do not have full control over your money.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

So perhaps the Bush plan will allow you to personally invest your money in US treasuries?

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Ironic, isn't it? That's one of the first investments they'll certify, since "bonds are safe". Thus making the only differences between the current system and the proposed system: 1) Your kids can inherit your SS, and 2) you can go broke when the government defaults (and do you think the SEC will investigate THAT fraud?)

 

Not just stupid...a !@#$ING stupid idea.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

I am against that as well. My guess is that he is tossing a bone to "the electorate is too stupid to manage their own money and need the government to tell them how to invest" crowd. That is the usual argument against private accounts, so my theory is that he is doing this to soothe those concerns. In essence, they are quasi-private accounts since you really do not have full control over your money.

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My guess is roughly similar: the "SS as it stands, and no other way" crowd don't want to see the guaranteed nature of Social Security go away. The "private investment of SS for a better return crowd" wants to see...private investment for a better return. Bush's "plan" (I still think "idea" is a better term: just something the administration floated to gauge reaction) is a compromise between those two ideas - and like any good compromise, it pisses everyone off because it does absolutely nothing, since it neither truly guarantees anything nor truly privatizes anything.

 

Were it up to me, I'd simply phase out the "required" Social Security payments over a period of time in favor of "voluntary" ones, with only those who contribute enrolled in the program. Thus, if people want to forsake the potential return of a privately managed account for the safety of government-gurarnteed retirement, they can do so; or they can invest their own money into their own retirement plan and tell the government to !@#$ off. Of course, as a practical matter, that would require a COMPLETE redesign of the entire Ponzi-scheme nature of Social Security as it stands now...but I fail to see where that's a bad thing. And clearly, my idea's a good compromise, since it can't fail to piss everyone off...

[Campy]

Watching ABC right now - did any of you just hear Senator Graham (R-NC) critique of Bush's SS plan?

 

Joe Biden was running his mouth, Graham followed with "Joe's right in that you can't tax your way in to solvency and you can't grow into solvency through the accounts the president has suggested."

 

I wonder if there'll be repercussions from the GOP hardliners..

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

Watching ABC right now - did any of you just hear Senator Graham (R-NC) critique of Bush's SS plan?

 

Joe Biden was running his mouth, Graham followed with "Joe's right in that you can't tax your way in to solvency and you can't grow into solvency through the accounts the president has suggested."

 

I wonder if there'll be repercussions from the GOP hardliners..

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Of course, those statements stem from a fallacy that maintaining Social Security's solvency is possible or even, as it's structured now, desirable...or even that Bush's plan is designed to maintain solvency of SS. Considering that the plan involves the diversion of funds from traditional SS to private accounts, I could argue the opposite.

 

But basically, I see statements like these as representative of the fundamental lack of any understanding of what to do about Social Security. No one even agree on what the goals of a suggested reform should be beyond "It needs to be fixed."

[Campy]

No one even agree on what the goals of a suggested reform should be beyond "It needs to be fixed."

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To Graham's credit, he did say that he thought the problem that needed to be addressed, and hasn't as of yet, is that everybody is concentrating on the front-end when the problem that needs to be addressed is the payout and schedule of benefits.

 

It sounds to me like he's looking at the situation from a perspective that at least has a chance of providing a real solution.