WELCOME TO OPINIONS BASED ON FACTS (OBOF)
Name
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Published
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OVERVIEW
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Dec. 28, 2010
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 1
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Dec. 30, 2010
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 2
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Jan. 10, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 3
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Jan. 17, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 4
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Jan. 24, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 5
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Jan. 31, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 6
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Feb. 07, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 7
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Feb. 14, 2011
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SPECIAL ISSUE
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Feb. 18, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 8
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Feb. 21, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 9
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Mar. 01, 2011
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SOCIAL SECURITY PART 10
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Mar. 07, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 1
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Mar. 14, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 1A
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Mar. 21, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 2
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Mar. 25, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 3
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Mar. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 4
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Apr. 04, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 5
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Apr. 11, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 6
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Apr. 18, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 7
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Apr. 25, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 7A
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Apr. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 8
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May 02, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 9
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May 09, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 10
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May 16, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 11
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May 24, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 12
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Jun. 06, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 13
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Jun. 20, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 14
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JULY 05,2011
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SS & MORE PART 14A
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JULY 18, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 15
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JULY 19, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 16
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AUG. 03, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 17
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AUG. 15, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 18
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Aug. 29, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 19
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Sept. 12, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 20
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Sept. 26, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 21
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Oct. 10, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 22
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Oct. 24, 2011
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SS & MORE PART 22 EXTRA
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Nov. 04, 2011
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IN THIS ISSUE
1. Chang in postings.
2. A tremendous attach on Social Security by the Super Committee and important comments.
3. Social Security background from posting 19 on Sept. 12, 2011.
4. Parting thought.
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"VOTE AN EDUCATED VOTE"
What is an educated vote? It is one that has been made with as much knowledge, based on facts, not misinformation, that an individual can obtain.
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EXTRA ~ EXTRA ~ EXTRA
READ ALL ABOUT IT
To my faithful readers and new one also. I am going to change how often I will be writing you. You may recall that for a long time I posted once every week and then it got a little to much, so I changed to every two weeks.
Well, there is just so much that needs all of our attentions that I am going to start posting quite a few EXTRAS. As far as a set schedule is concerned, it will remain every two weeks, however, I will be posting quite a bit between the schedule postings.
Folks, there is a lot happening to our country that is serious and we all need to be as informed as possible. As usual, I will try hard to only provide information based on facts. I will be putting in my opinion, as usual, but based on all the facts I can find. I am spending more time than ever to get the information and I am real concerned about the future of our country. The most I can do is to try and provide you information that, of course, you can find, but it takes a lot of time and searching. I have the time where you probably don't.
My next posting will be Monday the 7th. It may be late Monday night, but I'll do my best to get it out sometime on Monday. You might do well to just count on looking for it on Tuesday. I know it will be there then.
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A TREMENDOUS ATTACH ON
SOCIAL SECURITY
This posting is entirely about Social Security and the Super Committee. There are just two articles and they are good and important, but more important than the articles are the comments at the end of the articles. These are people from all across the country and it shows that they are beginning to know what is going on with Social Security.
Dr. Allen W. Smith Ph.D., has been trying for the last ten years, full time, to educate the public as to what has happened to the Social Security Trust Fund. It is beginning to sink in.
When you have read this, and if you are so inclined, and I hope you will be, call and write you Senators and Representative. Tell them to lay off of SS. Because SS is a completely different structure than Medicare, it must be treated differently. At the end of the two articles and the comments, I am posting one section of OBOF Part 19, Sept.12, 2011, which gives you a summary background and why SS is in the present situation, in case you want to know more about SS. In some of my earlier posting, I go into more detail about SS.
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Super Committee Cuts To Social Security Divert From Real Issues
Wed, 11/02/2011 - 1:50pm —
The Congressional Super Committee to cut the budget deficit, due to report soon, has let it be known that it will cut Social Security benefits. Let me be short and sour about this. It is a public relations stunt. They basically say so. All this is about is showing the world America
Other allegedly serious Democratic economists from fancy institutions have made the same argument. The reason is simple. You seemingly can make modest adjustments to Social Security to dent or even eliminate the projected longer-run shortfall. You can’t do that with Medicare.
In exchange for these Social Security cuts, the Democrats expect the Republicans to consider tax increases. They are probably going to be rolled again by the intransigent Republicans, who believe avoiding all taxes on the rich is the sure path to infinite re-electability.
So let’s be clear. The Social Security Administration projects that benefits will rise by one percent of GDP from five percent to six percent over the next 20 years or so and then stabilize or even fall a bit due to the rising elderly population. One percent. That’s what all this is about.
This increase can be covered completely by raising payroll taxes by 6.2 to 7.2 percent for workers and employers. All of it can be covered by eliminating the cap on Social Security taxes, now about $109,000 a year. Even though it’s not practical, raising the cap to the point where it covers 90 percent of wages earned — the original level — would go a long way to paying for benefits.
But let me remind us all: There is plenty of room to raise other taxes. America Europe , much cheaper or free health care, and so on.
Let me also remind us that Social Security is not very generous. The average payment is $14,000 a year. It is getting less generous. It used to replace 55 percent of retirement income, but benefits were reduced in the 1980s. It now covers on average 41 percent of retirement income. In 2031, it will cover 32 percent of retirement income.
We have already reduced the program’s generosity. Yet Social Security provides nearly all income for one quarter of the elderly and more than half the income for more than half of the elderly.
The Super Committee will say it simply wants to make the inflation calculation more accurate. It will reduce benefits. But government research suggests elderly costs rise faster in price than the traditional measures of inflation.
The Super Committee is likely to do some real axing, if it gets its way, on Medicare. But it, too, is not a generous program. The typical beneficiary earns $23,000 a year, yet co-pays and deductibles are high. One analysis by the CBO showed that the typical employer plan provides 88 percent of beneficiary’s needs. According to an analysis by the Congressional Research Service, Medicare provides only 76 percent.
One last important point. Big cuts in Medicare and Medicaid will mean that health care expenditures will go up because Americans will get their insurance in the private market or on the public dole somehow. It will not cut overall medical costs, which are ridiculously high in America
What will drive future budget deficits is Medicare and Medicaid, not Social Security, and for the umpteenth time, the reason is that overall health costs are expected to rise quickly. This means we have to reform our uniquely inefficient healthcare system. Congress is, as usual, diverting us from the real issues. No wonder Americans like
Occupy Wall Street .
Occupy Wall Street .
A final word on taxes. The top 1 percent pay federal income taxes at a rate of 23 percent. If we raised it to their rate only ten years ago, we’d collect about $100 billion a year. If we reversed the Bush tax cuts on those who make $250,000 a year, we’d raise about $830 billion over ten years. If we reversed all the tax cuts, including on the middle class, which I’d favor, we’d raise about $3.5 trillion over ten years.
We have plenty of taxing capacity to take care of our needs. We simply refuse to act as a modern nation, driven by myths that we can somehow return to the simplicity of colonial America America
Roosevelt Institute Senior Fellow Jeff Madrick is the author of Age of Greed.
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COMMENTS:
S.S. Reduction
I've planned my working life for forty years based on a promise that the government made to me regarding S.S. Now they will change their rules and leave me out to hang. If you're going to change benefits it should affect only the workers who have yet to enter the workforce. Keep the promise you made forty years ago......
Where is our money?
Permalink Submitted by iampartofthe99p... on Thu, 11/03/2011 - 10:40am
The Social Security System should be selfsyfficient if the politicians kept their hand off our money. Right now, all they need to do is to pay the big debt the Federal Government owes to the SS, from which not even the interest have been paying for years. The SS funds are ours, we contributed to the system, the Federal Government has nothing to do with that money.
So, they need to reinburse the several trilions of dollars they took out of our funds. No matter who did it, the important thing is they have to pay it back and stop trying to deprive our benefits. Why we the people get so easely distracted by dirty political games? Let's make them to do real job for what we ellected them which is to protect our nation from being deprived. Both, Democrats and Republicans are just the same, and the Tea Party is in no way different. I am part of the 99 percent.
Social Security
First, Social Security is not an entitlement. There is no Government money involved (except for the money the bureaucrats have stolen and Bush put up for security on loans from China
The only thing legislators are supposed to be doing is manage the funds. But, in my opinion once again they just can't keep their hands off the money so here we go again. They have done nothing to justifly their exhorbitant salaries and benefits. We need to adjust legislators salaries to work performed and not be paying them to set at home more than they are at work, no more double dipping on benefits, pension from more than one office held.
Inflation adjustments to SS,and I don't feel rich.
Permalink Submitted by rjpowerlaw on Thu, 11/03/2011 - 11:20am
The gov't leaves out groceries and gasoline prices in computing inflation adjustments for SS. Guess what I spend the bulk of my money on while living out the balance of my life in a trailer.
If I thought that we could really get the money out of politics, I would gladly pay my proportionate share of the cost of government funding of elections provided those costs had a realistic ceiling, the election cycle was shortened, and election days were on the weekend so that more of us could vote. In the meantime call every senator on the Select Committee to Hose the Poor and Elderly, and tell them how you will vote next November.
social security
I am so sick and tired of the poor people getting poorer and the rich getting richer. I am on disability and I barely make my bills every month. I have to wait over a month to get a doctor's appt. I don't understand how the richest country in the world can treat its citizens like crap while the US
This is part of the reason the younger generation doesn't want to do anything. In my day, we worked hard and put into the social security system for our old age, and now there probably won't be anything there for us when we need it. The young people look at us as fools. They probably think, why should I put in the years on a job for nothing. The US
social security
Let’s see if I have this right? They're going to cut from the people that drive this country's economy, the consumer and give the money to the people at the top that stick their money in the bank and sit on it. And this is going to help the economy how?
Removal of Social Security benefits
Permalink Submitted by Cheryl Trago on Thu, 11/03/2011 - 1:24pm
I've worked for over 30 years. Cutting back on SS monthy payments is atrocious. That money I put in to SS is MINE. The government takes from everyone's accounts to pay for the wars and the needed equipment and other special interests.
Shame on you. How dare you steal money from the people who have to live off of their social security.
Has the US
Social Security
Permalink Submitted by Patricia Jackson on Thu, 11/03/2011 - 1:40pm
I think The initial retirement should be raised to 65 and full to 70 as we all live a lot longer now. This would put a lot more money in the account. I also am in favor of getting rid of all the congressmen as they are all millionaires they have no idea what it is like to live on SS. also they are all too old to be in office. Also as long as we vote for republicans this country is going to HELL in a hand basket!!!!!!!!!!!
Social Security
Everyone knows why social security is part of the budget. The politicians borrowed from the social security fund and gave IOUS to the social security fund so they could use it. Now they want to cut social security benefits. Wake up America
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The Campaign Against Social Security Still, -- Somehow, -- Marches On
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette columnist Gene Lyons is a National Magazine Award winner and co-author of "The Hunting of the President" (St. Martin 's Press, 2000). You can email Lyons
Wed, 11/02/2011 - 4:17pm —
People should be skeptical of the decades-long propaganda war against America
The War On Social Security
Now and then, George W. Bush told the unvarnished truth -- most often in jest. Consider the GOP presidential nominee's Oct. 20, 2000, speech at a high-society, $800-a-plate fundraiser at New York City
"This is an impressive crowd," he said. "The haves and the have-mores. Some people call you the elites; I call you my base."
Any questions?
Eight months later, President Bush delivered sweeping tax cuts to that patrician base. Given current hysteria over what a recent Washington Post article called "the runaway national debt," it requires an act of historical memory to recall that the Bush administration rationalized reducing taxes on inherited wealth because paying down the debt too soon might roil financial markets.
Eleven years later, the Post warns in a ballyhooed article reading like something out of Joseph Heller's "Catch-22," that Social Security -- the 75-year-old bedrock of millions of Americans' retirement hopes -- has "passed a treacherous milestone," gone "cash negative," and "is sucking money out of the Treasury."
Anybody who discerns a relationship between these events, that is, between a decade of keeping the yachts and Lear jets of the "have-mores" running smoothly and a manufactured crisis supposedly threatening grandma's monthly Social Security check, must be some kind of radical leftist.
That, or somebody skeptical of the decades-long propaganda war against America
All in service, alas, of a single unstated premise: that the "have-mores" have made off with grandma's money fair and square. They have no intention of paying it back. That's the only possible interpretation of the Post's admonition that "the $2.6 trillion Social Security trust fund will provide little relief. The government has borrowed every cent and now must raise taxes, cut spending or borrow more heavily from outside investors to keep benefit checks flowing."
Little relief? In fact, the law's working precisely as intended. After 28 years of generating huge payroll tax surpluses to cover the baby boomers' retirement benefits, the system must now begin to draw upon those funds to help pay current benefits -- the vast majority still covered by current payroll tax receipts.
"Rather than posing any sort of crisis," explains Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, "this is exactly what had been planned when Congress last made major changes to the program in 1983 based on the recommendations of the Greenspan commission."
Again, this is the beneficiaries' money, invested by the Social Security trustees in U.S. Treasury bonds drawn upon "the full faith and credit of the United States U.S.
A promise not very different, The Daily Howler's Bob Somerby points out, from the one implicit in your bank statement or 401(k) (if you're lucky enough to have one). Did you think the money was buried in earthen jars filled with gold bullion and precious stones?
This is my insert, not a part of the article. The above two paragraph are true and not true. It is true that there has been U. S.
Why can I say stolen? Because, contrary to the above, the Bonds are NOT the same Bonds given to China
Floyd ~ OBOF
Raise taxes, cut spending or borrow? What other options does the U.S.
On his New York Times blog, Paul Krugman dissects the "Catch-22" logic behind the Post's bogus crisis. You can't simultaneously argue "that the trust fund is meaningless, because SS is just part of the budget, then claim that some crisis arises when receipts fall short of payments, because SS is a standalone program." For practical purposes, it's got to be one or the other.
So is Social Security a "Ponzi" scheme? No, it's group insurance, not an investment. You die young, somebody else benefits. Its finances have been open public record since 1936. Do fewer workers support each beneficiary? Sure, but who cares? It's denominated in dollars, not a head count. The boomers were nearing 40 when the Reagan administration fixed the actuarial tables. No surprises there.
Are longer life expectancies screwing up the numbers? Not really. Most of the rise is explained by lower infant and child mortality, not by old-timers overstaying their welcome. Kevin Drum points out that gradually raising the payroll tax 1 percentage point and doubling the earnings cap over 20 years would make Social Security solvent forever.
But that's not good enough for the more hidebound members of the $800-a-plate set. See, over 75 years Social Security has provided a measure of dignity, security and freedom to working Americans that just annoys the hell out of their betters.
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette columnist Gene Lyons is a National Magazine Award winner and co-author of "The Hunting of the President" (St. Martin 's Press, 2000). You can email Lyons
~~~
Comments
social security
Permalink Submitted by Tom S. Brown on Fri, 11/04/2011 - 8:35am
To make the social security fund monetarily stronger simply remove the collection cap and collect on 100% of all income just like the system does on the first $106,800. That's what the young people should be fighter for not the demise of SS. If the feds don't raid the till it should be good to go forever with that financial source.
Social Security Cap
Permalink Submitted by jussmartenuf on Fri, 11/04/2011 - 9:10am
Sure, the rich will say they don't use social security so they should not have to pay for it. I don't have children in the schools either, but I help pay for education. I don't use the charity hospital, but I pay taxes to support it. I do not go to the public library, but I pay taxes so others can, on and on.
All of which brings up the issue of means testing. Someone who has a billion dollars should not qualify for SS. The estate tax should be modified upward and put back in place as it perpetuates aristocracies, such as Paris Hilton and others who can get by just fine on $500 million rather than $5 billion. Enough of the BS. Every Republican should be embarrassed and change their vote to reflect what is right for all. They would be the big winners again in the long run.
Everyone should know that
Permalink Submitted by AnneG.Arsenault on Fri, 11/04/2011 - 10:22am
Everyone should know that Social Security is doing well, even though Bush borrowed from it whenever he could. But somehow the Republican lies about how SS is dying have become the truth to many people. Can't someone do something to tell the truth to American people? I'm tired of the Republican scare tactics.
SOCIAL SECURITY
Permalink Submitted by donbela2002 on Fri, 11/04/2011 - 10:28am
So Social Security is a Ponzi scheme---what would you call the efforts to "privatize" Social Secuyrity especially in light of the recent Wall Street meltdown? Thank god, Georgie Bush didn't get his wish on that one. And for those Tea Party folks who collect Social Security who don't want any government interference in their lives, they should dis-enroll themsleves and let their children and grandchildren pay their bills, and oh yes, pull the plug on them when they have to go to the hospital.
Oh, Gene, don't you know?
Oh, Gene, don't you know? Wall Street needs propping up for the elite, therefore our Social Security must be turned into 401ks to make it easier for the elite to steal. They are trying to do the same thing to the military retirement system. We, the many, fight to preserve the wealth of the few, but now there are getting to be too many of us and to keep the elite from having to pay more for we who have fought for them, they want to steal our retirement, too. Pay attention, Gene. When the elite take it by what ever means, it's not stealing, it's the market system.
Social Security
12:03pm
Leave Social Security alone. If the government under Bush had not borrowed from Social Security like it was his personal account, Social Security would be in the black. Republicans want to privatize Social Security so their wealthy friends can make more money of the working poor and middle class. We better beware and wise up. Republicans will lie about anything to get what they want and tell us it's for our good.
~~~
The following was taken from my posting Part 19 September 12, 2011.
THIS IS URGENT AS THE SUPER COMMITTEE WILL BE LOOKING AT SOCIAL SECURITY THE SAME AS MEDICARE AND MEDICAID. IT CAN'T BE!!
A little background is necessary, in order to understand why SS does not and never has contributed to the deficit.
In 1983 it was recognized that outgo was going to be exceeding income soon. Also, in the future, Baby Boomers were going to be starting to retire and that was going to make things worse.
First, it should be understood that Social Security is not an entitlement program. An entitlement program is one in which the Government pays all or the largest part of the cost. As you will see, the Government does not and never has paid a dime for Social Security. Social Security is an insurance program and workers pay a premium taken out of each pay check called FICA (Federal Insurance Contribution Account). That is your account not the Government's.
President Reagan appointed a committee to study the future of SS and they set up the following plan. Before this plan, workers paid to cover the cost of SS for the previous generation. In order to make the program solvent thru 2040, FICA was raised, so that workers were paying for the needs of the previous generation and their own generation.
The idea was, that a surplus would build up, so that when the Baby Boomers started to retire in about 2018 there would be a surplus of more than $3 trillion. This was determined to be sufficient to meet the added outgo when Baby Boomers retired and when worker FICA would be reduced.
It was a great plan and would have worked, except for one thing. Presidents and Congresses of both Democrat and Republican just couldn't stand to see all that money just sitting there, being invested to add the interest to the surplus. So, what did they do? They STOLE the entire surplus that had amounted to $2.6 trillion at the time it was depleted. This was fraud pure and simple. It was against the law to use the surplus in this manner. The Budget Enforcement Act of 1990 made it illegal.
Starting in 2010, SS income did not meet outgo, so the Government had to put money into the SS program. Now many are claiming that this adds to the deficit and that SS is now costing the Government. I maintain that this is not true and that the money the Government is putting into the SS program now is simply a small down payment on the $2.6 trillion that has been stolen from the Social Security Trust Fund. If that money was in the Trust Fund, as it was suppose to be, the Government would not be putting any money into the SS program and the program would be solvent till 2036. The youngest Baby Boomer will be 79 by 2041.
There does need to be some reform in, the future, in order to keep the program solvent for 75 more years, but it shouldn't be, and can't be, treated the same as Medicare and Medicaid.
SOCIAL SECURITY IS THE MOST SUCCESSFUL PROGRAM THAT THE GOVERNMENT HAS EVER DEVELOPED.
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A PARTING THOUGHT
Nothing can help us face the unknown future with more courage and optimism than remembering the glory moments, and everybody has a few of them.
Eda LeShan
If the good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise, I'll talk with you again in 3 days, on Monday Nov. 7.
Floyd
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