I personally have some diversification in my retirement plans as others seem to have also and I certainly do not count SS in any large measure. I am willing to make sacrifices in order to preserve a future for my kids. But I can see for society as a whole, once a person starts to suckle the government teat it is going to be hard to get them off it.

But another event has happened today as well. The church that my father attends has already been on the phone, contacting their senior citizens, finding out who might be totally dependent on SS and who isn’t, who has other options and who doesn’t, etc. And the church is coming up with some plans of their own to step into the gap in what ways they can, if it comes right down to. Talk about efficient, RMJ!

I was wondering if any other churches are making plans on this point. It won’t help everyone, but it definitely will make a difference.

That being said, for those people who have paid into social security, they’re going to have to accept the fact that they’re not going to get everything they were promised. Those promises were lies. They believed those lies and, well, caviat emptor.

That doesn’t mean we leave people to twist. Honestly, my personal preference would be to let them suffer for trusting politicians to tell the truth, but I know that’s politically not feasible. But we have to cut back on unsustainable promises. Social Security was never intended as anything more than a supplement, not your full retirement. If your plan is to retire solely on Social Security, plan on living in a tent. Or with your kids.

The good news is, if you’re 55, you still have some time. You can start paying off your debts, you can put money into 401(k)s and IRAs, and no one says you have to retire at 62/65/67/whever your Social Security retirement age is. Sure, it won’t be the most comfortable retirement if you’re not already invested, but it’s better than doing without.

But what to do about what you’ve already paid in? Well, some of it you can kiss goodbye. Heck, you’ve already sacrificed the future value of the payments you made back-when, so you’ve already taken one on the chin. The financial rate of return on Social Security retirement insurance sucks compared to, say, the S&P500 rate of return.

So let’s guarantee some portion of what you’ve paid in. Let’s say that your employer contribution still gets paid into the system, no matter what. Now, say you’re over 40 and have been paying in for at least 15 years. Maybe 50% of your payments can be guaranteed? We’d have to do a lot more math than I want to bother with right now. We then take that money and let you invest it as you wish, whether that’s keeping it in Social Security, putting into the Stock Market, municipal bonds or plain-old savings, but it has to go into retirement, not your pocket. If you’re over, I don’t know, 60? You can stay in social security as is, but you’ll have to take a sizable cut in promised benefits. And if you’re under 40, we don’t guarantee much of anything, but you’ve got about 25 years to plan for your own retirement using your individual contribution, plus anything else you want to throw at it.

That’s an idea I’ve been running through my head for quite awhile. We have to step back from Social Security as it exists today. We have to force people to take responsibility for themselves and stop being dependent upon government. We have to remind people that “non-discretionary” refers to the idea that Congress doesn’t have to approve it every year and does not indicate that it’s “mandatory” spending.

There are areas we can cut the DoD. In particular, some of the bases in areas that are no longer strategically important, or where we have multiple bases fulfilling the same role in near proximity. Cut programs the military doesn’t want. Cut waste where we can.

But the real 800 pound deficit gorilla is entitlements. People need to stop looking at them as entitlements and start looking at them as what they are: The communal future spent to pay for the individual stupidity of the past.

Disability? That’s such a small portion of it and for such specific cases that I can live with it, even if I bristle paying it. But retirement? That should be your problem, not mine. Welcome to the world of the Wal-Mart Greeter.

If you eliminated the Social Insurance Taxes and their related expenses, our budget deficit in 2010 would have been about $175 billion. Instead, it was $1.3 trillion. That tells me all I need to know to tell me down which rat hole my money is really going.

I don’t know what the traditional 26 week unemployment payments were, but I’d wager they’re under $300 billion. Without Social Insurance other than traditional unemployment, we’d have an $865 billion private sector stimulus and a $475 billion deficit. Even paying Obama’s $287k per job, that’s over three million jobs. At a more realistic $40k per job, that’s almost twenty two million jobs.

Woah.

Who said social insurance is stimulus?

There are some good articles here at redstate as well if you just search “Social Security” in the custom search button on the top right of the page, but here’s a link to a really good one.

http://www.redstate.com/dhorowitz3/2011/06/16/time-to-opt-out-of-the-social-security-ponzi-scheme/

http://www.heritage.org/BudgetChartBook/

http://www.savingthedream.org/

http://www.heritage.org/BudgetChartBook/

http://www.savingthedream.org/

Those who are wards of the state deserve no voice in affairs of the state !

Therefore, those poor who are envious of the rich and greedily want to take from those who earned it, will continue to be supportive of income transfer systems. Not all, but way too many.

(a sad but true statement on human nature)

Therefore, those poor who are envious of the rich and greedily want to take from those who earned it, will continue to be supportive of income transfer systems. Not all, but way too many.

(a sad but true statement on human nature)

The painful answer is that it may very well not be. The SS program can be partially (I think about 80%) salvaged if we put a means test on it and raised the mandatory retirement age. Rich people and HENRYs would be stuck with a bum deal. More people would die prior to pay-off date under the proposed age adjustment. I can’t think of any nice way to fix this problem, but this at least distributes pain to those who can actually withstand it.

I understand the program itself is fatally flawed and unsustainalbe but what about the older people already dependant or about to become depandant?

As a society, we will simply have to get back tot he traditional view where children give back the gift in a sense by looking after or at least financially providing for aging parents. Our current system will financially collapse if we attempt to honor everything that was mistakenly promised.

We desperately need a GOP messaging committee, that can stay one step ahead of the Liberals stories and lies, rather than always playing catch up. Bush was bad to non-existent with his message.

My question is: What is the conservative view of money that people have paid into SS their whole working lives. how is that to be recouped? I understand the program itself is fatally flawed and unsustainalbe but what about the older people already dependant or about to become depandant? I myself am 55 years old and would support the repeal of Social security but I wouldn’t mind getting back some of what I paid in. I could pay off my house and then use the motrgage amount to live on or invest as an example.

Sorry for the naive question but I have to counter some arguments at work with some of my Lib co-workers at the ‘watercooler”

Thank You

We lose way too many battles in the PR department.