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elkid
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 Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:05 Post subject:
| genie wrote: | To me it's just another form of welfare where someone else benefits from my hard work yet I don't. That's crap.  |
I'm sure your parents and grandparents would thank you for that perspective.
Social security was not a new concept when it was introduced in the US in 1935. It was steeped in historical precedent, from the English poor laws of the 1600s to original military pension plan when our country was being founded to the Civil War pension program in the mid 1800s. Company pensions came about, and then the Industrial Revolution which completely changed the makeup of the American family and how it was funded in later years, and then the Great Depression came. Alternative pension programs supported by people like Townsend (his final version of the Townsend Plan became the basis of the SS law), Sinclair, Coughlin, and Long sprang up.
Many people don't like the concept of SS because it's a Socialist idea, first used at the national level in Germany under von Bismarck. Such an important ideology was social insurance that it was written into the Atlantic Charter, the founding document of the UN (yes, one of the UN's main principles is social insurance). The SS Act has been amended a few times to keep up with the times, including cost of living adjustments and disability regulations, and was used as the backbone for the Medicare Act in 1965.
Part of being a member of an organized, civilized society is a responsibility to the other members of that society. By paying into SS today, you expect that your fellow citizens will pay into the system tomorrow to fund your later years. SS grew as a viable concept in the US mainly because the Great Crash and the Depression that followed wiped out family savings for many, who were left destitute, homeless, and starving, a way of life from which many did not recover. Today less than half of the US workforce is covered by any type of employment-related pension program other than Social Security, and how many of those company-funded pensions are we seeing being taken away? The US Air nightmare alone clearly shows a traditional pension plan may not be there when you need it.
Good, bad, indifferent: SS is a necessary program and is not welfare. It's more like a forced prepay retirement plan. Given the dramatic change in family makeup, average number of children per household, and the increasing number of childfree households, it's easy to see why SS might go bankrupt. While I firmly believe that will affect me, as in there will be nothing left for me in 30 someodd years, I still feel an obligation to the generations who came before me. I do not begrudgingly pay SS, for I know it goes to help people who need it earlier in life through disability and later in their retirement years. It helps many of whom built this country, fought for it, and in going to spouses, those who died for it.
Getting back to the original topic, privatization would kill SS. Because the next Great Crash is looming just around the corner.
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elkid
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:08 Post subject:
| sonnylax wrote: | | So the federal govt. is responsible to provide income (cradle to grave) because Americans are stupid & can't keep their hands off that moolah? Does anyone take any responsibility for their own actions anymore? |
I hope for your sake that you never lose a job due to cutbacks, find yourself without health insurance, and have a medical emergency. Or that you have an 80/20 plan and need a major procedure where the hospital is part of your insurance plan's network but none of the specialists are and you have to foot the bill. How often we forget how perilously close we all are to financial ruin. All it takes is one event and your entire life could be destroyed.
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runaroundsue
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:09 Post subject:
why can't ss be more like welfare. If you have assets and income that put you above a certain level, you don't receive any? I do see some well off seniors "suddenly" giving nice gifts to their children as a problem. But aren't "gifts" heavily taxed and it would benefit the system as well?
Am I the only person that is actually surprised that ss has lasted this long? I actually think someone's done something right over the years. Most ponzi collapse a lot earlier.
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sonnylax
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:15 Post subject:
| runaroundsue wrote: | | Am I the only person that is actually surprised that ss has lasted this long? I actually think someone's done something right over the years. Most ponzi collapse a lot earlier. |
I'm amazed that it has lasted this long.
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sonnylax
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:23 Post subject:
| elkid wrote: | | I hope for your sake that you never lose a job due to cutbacks, find yourself without health insurance, and have a medical emergency. Or that you have an 80/20 plan and need a major procedure where the hospital is part of your insurance plan's network but none of the specialists are and you have to foot the bill. How often we forget how perilously close we all are to financial ruin. All it takes is one event and your entire life could be destroyed. |
The government is not the end all, be all. Nor is it the solution to every ill in society. If I lost my job or faced an emergency, I'm sure I could lean on my parents/brother/family to help out. Not everyone is close to financial ruin. I know it may be hard for you to accept - But some folks actually work hard and prepare for potential financial problems down the road.
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elkid
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:25 Post subject:
| runaroundsue wrote: | | why can't ss be more like welfare. |
Again, it's structured more like a pension plan than a need-based one.
| Quote: | | But aren't "gifts" heavily taxed and it would benefit the system as well? |
Yes, at around 50% if they exceed $11,000.
| Quote: | | Most ponzi collapse a lot earlier. |
Ponzi? Hardly. No early payoffs, or bigger risks on the backend. Talk about spin, spin, spin.
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runaroundsue
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:33 Post subject:
| elkid wrote: |
Ponzi? Hardly. No early payoffs, or bigger risks on the backend. Talk about spin, spin, spin. |
elkid--
if it's a pension plan, how come people who have NEVER put in a dime....get out???????? spin. spin. spin
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elkid
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:40 Post subject:
| runaroundsue wrote: | elkid--
if it's a pension plan, how come people who have NEVER put in a dime....get out???????? spin. spin. spin |
I didn't say it WAS a pension plan, I said it was structured as one. Hence why widows/widowers get their spouses' money until they themselves die.
Surely a SAHM like yourself sees the benefit of getting out without having to put in. Unless you don't believe that someone like yourself who gives up the option of a career to care for his/her children didn't actually do work throughout their lifetime. I don't want to imagine the uproar if someone like me, childfree by choice, worked their whole life and then spat on you in your retirement years because you didn't "work".
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runaroundsue
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:51 Post subject:
| elkid wrote: |
I didn't say it WAS a pension plan, I said it was structured as one. Hence why widows/widowers get their spouses' money until they themselves die.
Surely a SAHM like yourself sees the benefit of getting out without having to put in. Unless you don't believe that someone like yourself who gives up the option of a career to care for his/her children didn't actually do work throughout their lifetime. I don't want to imagine the uproar if someone like me, childfree by choice, worked their whole life and then spat on you in your retirement years because you didn't "work". |
I put in from 18-30, so I did contribute for 12 years. Regardless, I don't think I should get out based on husband's earnings. Like I said, it would last longer if it were treated as welfare. I will not need any ss if my husband and I stay married and I have access to his assets. If those plans go awry and he screws me over-----well, that's what "welfare" is all about.....helping me to get a start on supporting myself.
I don't get your "childless" statement, Elkid? there are plenty of working moms that contribute in. I believe you are trying to make a personal attack on my situation and that shouldn't be allowed on these forums. Plus, you spin does not match my feelings at all and I do cry foul. For all you know, I may have already contributed more into ss than you. You do not know enough about me to make such a comparison.
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elkid
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:54 Post subject:
| runaroundsue wrote: | | I don't get your "childless" statement, Elkid? there are plenty of working moms that contribute in. I believe you are trying to make a personal attack on my situation and that shouldn't be allowed on these forums. Plus, you spin does not match my feelings at all and I do cry foul. For all you know, I may have already contributed more into ss than you. You do not know enough about me to make such a comparison. |
<sigh> No, I did not attack you. I know plenty of women like me who do indeed complain about having to fund the retirement of women who never worked a day in their life to care for their children. I bet a few would say 12 years compared to 44+ is not equitable, either. I was simply offering an answer to a question you posed, not attacking you nor doing a comparison of any kind. I don't attack because I myself have been, and unfairly so. But believe me, if I did, it would be more than obvious.
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runaroundsue
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 09:59 Post subject:
| elkid wrote: |
<sigh> No, I did not attack you. I know plenty of women like me who do indeed complain about having to fund the retirement of women who never worked a day in their life to care for their children. I bet a few would say 12 years compared to 44+ is not equitable, either. I was simply offering an answer to a question you posed, not attacking you nor doing a comparison of any kind. I don't attack because I myself have been, and unfairly so. But believe me, if I did, it would be more than obvious. |
that complaint is about as valid as the rich complaining that they pay more taxes. You can't compare 12 years to 44, you have no idea what is put in. And for what it's worth, if it's just about the number of years put in......make mine 15 years. I've file the last 3 years. Darn my running abilities!!!
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genie
Master of Prissface
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 10:42 Post subject:
| elkid wrote: |
<sigh> No, I did not attack you. I know plenty of women like me who do indeed complain about having to fund the retirement of women who never worked a day in their life to care for their children. I bet a few would say 12 years compared to 44+ is not equitable, either. I was simply offering an answer to a question you posed, not attacking you nor doing a comparison of any kind. I don't attack because I myself have been, and unfairly so. But believe me, if I did, it would be more than obvious. |
Sure sounds like welfare to me. How can you justify it as a "funded" pension plan when, like Sue (and you here) said, people who DO NOT PUT A DIME IN still benefit. Funded pension plans, i.e. the 401K type things that we have at work, are contributed to by the employee who ends up getting the money at retirement (unless they die of course, in which case I am fine with the spouse getting it as part of the estate).
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elkid
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 11:12 Post subject:
| genie wrote: | | How can you justify it as a "funded" pension plan |
| Quote: | Main Entry: 1pen·sion
Pronunciation: 'pen(t)-sh&n
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French, from Latin pension-, pensio, from pendere to pay -- more at PENDANT
1 /'pen(t)-sh&n/ : a fixed sum paid regularly to a person: a archaic : WAGE b : a gratuity granted (as by a government) as a favor or reward c : one paid under given conditions to a person following retirement from service or to surviving dependents
Main Entry: 1wel·fare
Pronunciation: 'wel-"far, -"fer
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from the phrase wel faren to fare well
2 a : aid in the form of money or necessities for those in need b : an agency or program through which such aid is distributed |
That's how. NEED, pure and simple.
| Quote: | | Funded pension plans, i.e. the 401K type things |
A 401K is different than a traditional funded pension plan. With a 401K (defined contribution plan) you control the divestiture, you can cash out at any time, and the money is available on a lump sum basis at retirement. With a pension plan (defined benefit pension) your employer controls the divestiture, you can borrow against it but not fully cash it out, and the payments come in the form of structured annuities at retirement.
GETTING BACK ON TRACK if SS were to be privatized it would follow a 401K funding scheme. Anyone who had a 401K, or a 403B, in recent years knows the dangers and volatility of the markets that support them. How many people of near retirement age did you pity in 2001? I say keep the current structure, following a more traditional pension plan scheme, and make every earned dollar SS tax eligible.
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gretriever
Hipster Doofus
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 11:16 Post subject:
| runaroundsue wrote: | | why can't ss be more like welfare. If you have assets and income that put you above a certain level, you don't receive any? |
That is the SSI (Supplemental Security Income) program. It gets paid based on one's need, and takes into account sources of income and certain assets (such as - while the home you own and live in is not counted, your cabin by the lake would be). It gets paid to those who have not worked enough for quarters of coverage to receive Social Security; or they do receive SS, but it's a very low amount.
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runaroundsue
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Posted: 10/26/04 - 12:25 Post subject:
| gretriever wrote: | | That is the SSI (Supplemental Security Income) program. It gets paid based on one's need, and takes into account sources of income and certain assets (such as - while the home you own and live in is not counted, your cabin by the lake would be). It gets paid to those who have not worked enough for quarters of coverage to receive Social Security; or they do receive SS, but it's a very low amount. |
cabin on the river 
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