OT - Social Security

In the final analysis, that is ALL that matters. :)

Reply to
Swingman
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When I see a man going down the wrong road, I don't call him an asshole for trying to go that way.

I just talk to him about the road he should be on.

Thomas J. Watson - Cabinetmaker (ret.) (Real Email is tjwatson1ATcomcastDOTnet)

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Reply to
Tom Watson

Just because I'm not responding to whatever point you are, doesn't mean I've missed the one I'm referring to.

Fine. You show me the stats on the net worth of congress people when they leave office and then we'll talk. And I never said they wouldn't be happy to get it. I'd be happy if you gave me $1000, but it represents a very small portion of my net worth. If I didn't get it, it wouldn't change my lifestyle.

BS. There hasn't been an outcry to change SS in the past 40 years because the seasoned citizens are the most disciplined voting group in the country. You go talking about making sweeping changes to SS as an elected representative and see where that gets you. You tell me when there was a major voter push to modify SS in a substantial way that would bring the cost of the program under control.

Well, I figure about $100,000 has been put in on my behalf so far, so I'll charge my emergency room stay to that. And I tell you what...don't worry about me. Maybe you need a nanny state, but I don't.

todd

Reply to
todd

LOL ... say what?

Simply try addressing the point in the thread that _you_ originally jumped in to.

Don't look now, but _you_ brought up "net worth" of congressmen, _you_ back up what you brought up.

You just missed it, dude ... you were obviously too young to have noticed. There has been an outcry about the SS fund for years and it has been an issue in almost every local campaign for congress since I was in High School ... I even debated it in HS in 1961 ... before you were born. .

With an attitude like that, live long enough and you _will_ get one.

Reply to
Swingman

eligibility was set at 65. I could be wrong, though.

The average life expectancy is not the average age that a person over 50 dies at. It is an average age that people live overall, which includes death of childhood diseases. If you think of it an average age of death would have to include a whole bunch of people of all ages (down to newborns) to come up with an average. These children did not contribute to the S/S.

People have always lived long lives if they survived childhood, childbirth or workplace accidents. This brings to mind a headstone I saw in my town. The person was born in 1799 and died in 1901 -- 101 years old. A good old life, especially for the age, imagine the person lived through the entire

19th century!

Reply to
Eric Tonks

Actually, IMHO, those old estimates proved reasonable accurate. However,

2010 is now six years, away. Currently, the estimates are that somewhere between 2010 and 2013, the monthly SSA expediture will, for the first time, ever, exceed the monthly income. Somewhere around 2030, the "Trust Fund" will be completely empty.

The monies collected in FICA taxes/contributions has ALWAYS gone directly into the US Treasury. It's not like they were put into a bank, somewhere. The collected funds were spent to pay for programs of the Federal government. (The Social Security Administration does not collect FICA, the IRS does. SSA operates on Congressional approved appropriations just like every other federal agency).

The Trust Fund(s), (there's a couple of them), are accounting fictions to keep track of the FICA taxes/contributions separate from common taxes. And they always have been.

Analogy. You, and your family, agree to a retirement plan. You have ten kids. Ten percent of everyone's earnings are sent to a designated to a "trust" fund, except the monies are really put into a general household account. When you reach retirement age, you start collecting money from the "trust" fund, except it really comes from the general household account. However, by now, your ten kids have a total of 100 grandkids who are contributing to the "trust fund", too, so you're withdrawals are not noticeable. Your 100 grandkids, produce ten kids each and contribution grows dramatically as 1000 great-grandkids add their contributions to the "trust fund". However, the 1000 great-grandkids, instead of ten kids each, only have three kids each. Now those three thousand great-great grandkids are forced to support well over a thousand retired relatives.

Did that help explain the problems?

The performance of the economy as a whole isn't as important as the sheer number of people paying into the system. Because of the caps on covered earnings, few people paying ever larger contributions isn't the same as many people paying smaller contributions.

The SS Act, is like many federal programs, a monsterous glob. For instance, from the original act with a single beneficiary type...

A- Covered wage earner B- Spouse of a covered wage earner C- Child of a covered wage earner D-Widow of a covered wage earner F-Parent/Grandparent of a covered wage earner HA-Disable covered wage earner DAC- Disabled "adult" child of a covered wage earner W-Disabled widow of a covered wage earner J-Special Payment and coverage provisions

"Wage earner" is a traditional term. The modern term is "beneficiary" Disability payments used to constitute about 1/2 of the monthly SSA disbursment. With the aging "baby boomers", I expect that percentage will decrease and I have no idea what it is currently. However, I do know that

18 months seems to be the disability "magic number" The people that have drawn disability for 18 months and ever get back to work, drops dramatically.

BTW, originally, the Act was specifically targeted for wage earners. Self employed people were not covered. Most, if not all state and federal people were not covered. Over the decades, practically every working (and some non-working) people have been covered by the Act. (See vow-of-poverty cases and the concept of wages-in-kind that extended coverage to various religious orders)

The original intention of the Act was to provide ADDITIONAL funding to lower end wage earners to make their retirements, if not confortable, at least bearable. That's why, all the computations are heavily weighted so that the lower end wage earner receiveds proportionally a greater return on contributions than the higher wage earners. High end earners, really have a poor "return on investment", at least compared to lower income earners. (The benefit computations are convoluted as hell, but basically, the higher a beneficiary's "average monthy wage" over their working life, the lower the percentage of the wage they are likely to collect in monthly benefits. Let's say your Average Monthly Wage, was was 1000 dollars. (Indexed, adjusted for inflation, yada, yada, yada). The compution has "bend" points. You might receive 75% of the first 500 dollars of an "average monthly wage", then 60% of an AMW between 500 and 750 dollars, and the 40% of anything over

750 dollars in AMW.

Modern private pension plans, normally incorporate and anticipate a SS covered entitlement as part of the plan. In other words, the SS Act is so interwoven in the fabric of America, that ANY adjustments, corrections, reforms have to be very carefully considered, least dire and completely unintentional consequences result.

As a knee-jerk conservative, I have a natural inclination towards privatization of Social Secuity...UNTIL one considers the mechanics of such a process. Somewhere along the line, BILLIONS of dollars in investment funds PER MONTH, would end up under the directions of a relatively few bureaucrats/investment counselers. The potentional for corruption internally, and scams externally, will be immense.

My predictions, and IMHO, they are not as wild as they might seem at first glance....are

SS benfits will be "means tested". If you a lottery winner, or a successful and frugal wage earner, you'll never collect a dime in SS benefits.

The covered retirment age will (again) be raised, probably ending up, somewhere around 71 or 72.

The reductions assessed for "early retirment" will be increased.

Some classes of beneficiaries (dependent grandparents????) will be restricted and eventually de-entitled. (De-entitled?? Is there such a word?)

Cost-of-living formulas, (that currently determine rate increases every year) will be re-computed to reflect proportionally smaller increases (Such things as new-housing costs will be excluded from the formula, under the belief that very few 72 year old people buy new houses.) Some portion of an individual's (probably less than 10%) will be "privatized" via 401K-type plans. NOTE: While taxes maybe be delayed, eventually the government WILL collect taxes on those "earnings".

Full-blown, stay at home and never-lift-a-finger retirements, are already decreasing as a percentage of the total population. The trend to part-time and reduced income work for seniors, will continue to increase.

And for a really big prediction. How many people will be able to guess where I worked for 30 years?

James... BTW, Civil Service Retirements, Veteran's Retirements (etc) are all in the same catagory.

Reply to
James

We debated this very practice 42 years ago, in High School government class. :)

Just like most forms of "insurance", a merry-go-round you can't stop, or get off of.

I am with you 100% on all the above. My youngest daughter's college fund, despite careful and professional attention, lost almost 70% of its value in the last four years, just as she needed it ... surprise, surprise!

None of which will likely apply to congress critters, Todd. :)

Having been self-employed my entire life, I will continue to "work" until I drop ... but I would do it anyway because my work is, and always has been, things that I take a passionate interest in.

Excellent post! Thank you!

Reply to
Swingman

That's simple: "wealthy" is someone who has more than you do (when the term is being uttered by a politician to "regular folks"). The "rich" are those who make more than you do. Of course this means that anybody who makes more than you do, or has more than you do should be taxed heavily in order to make sure that they eventually are equal to you -- regardless of how hard they have worked. Of course this doesn't apply to the person on the podium who more than likely makes their definition of "rich" (often now referred to as someone making more than $100k per year) look like the poor house. Thus you have one candidate who made money the old fashioned way (he married it) and another who is a multi-hundred millionaire by nature of sueing for the "oppressed" and keeping 60% of their winnings telling those who make more than $100k how they should suck it up and "pay their fair share".

Reply to
Mark & Juanita

population,

OK, Swingman, let's start back here. Since you're so fond of asking for references for statistics, what is your source for the above? Keep in mind that the 40 senators being millionaires is a minimum number. Because of the way the numbers are reported, the actual net worth could be understated considerably. Take Hillary Clinton, for example. Guess what, she didn't make the list of the 40 senators who are millionaires. Her net worth is estimated to be between $352,000 and $3.8 million. Take a guess which number is used as the basis of determining whether or not she's a millionaire. I'll be damned if I can find a link to the raw data on all the senators, but keep the following in mind. 1) The net worth is based on data provided by the congress folks themselves and 2) The number used as the basis could be low by a factor of at least 10.

todd

Reply to
todd

That's pretty much it. You can be rich but you accumulate wealth. Rich people have a high income and tend to spend it, but wealthy people may spend a lot, but have assets such as real estate, bank deposits, large stock portfolios. Ed

Reply to
Edwin Pawlowski

Some do and some don't. It's not simple. CSRS is just about over since there was a switch to FERS in 1984. Since the retirement change is still in transition it get pretty complicated but all congressmen pay Social Security payroll tax regardless of the retirment plan,i.e., they have 6.2 percent of pay up to 87,900 (2004 maximum)deducted from wages and 1.45 percent deducted for medicare. Since CSRS is 8 percent, if they have CSRS they end up having 14.2 percent deducted for the first $87,900 and 8% on salary above 87,900. That's a lot.

The other percents you stated are correct. Which means that all members are paying at least 1.3 percent more than regular ss for the first 87,900 plus above 87,900 they 8 percent if CSRS offset and 1.3 percent if FERS. FERS also has a 402 plan where the first 5 percent is matched; CSRS also has a 402 but no employer matching.

The numbers you gave are mostly for CSRS retirements, and those Congressmen were contributing a lot of money. The average guy would really scream if he had to contribute 15.65% of his salary; 6.2% for SS, 8% for CSRS, 1.45% for medicare.

The law limits retirements to 80 percent of the high 3 (that's for people that think Congressmen retire at their last salary). This confusion is increase when the term "full retirement" is used. It means that a percon retired at the age and with the number of years served to qualify for the full amount calculated for the number of years served. If a person doesn't meet that qualification then they get a deferred retirement (wait till they are older before the pension starts), or a reduced pension, or both a deferred and reduced pension.

The best site I've seen on this subject is:

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yeah, Congressmen and Judges seem to get a pretty good deal, a lot better than the regular federal workers.

Reply to
George E. Cawthon

Sorry, I was replying to the effectiveness of the Swiss Army.

What did you think I was replying to?

Reply to
Mark

Swingman responds:

Yeah. Figure 36 years old, never been hurt, enver been ill, never been out of work. So far, so good. But...bet on things changing as the years add up. He doesn't think so, though.

Charlie Self "There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America." William J. Clinton

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Reply to
Charlie Self

$100K doesn't make it. Maybe twice or three times that for a minimum of a decade?

And the final candidate (of realistic candidates) also made his bucks the old-fashioned way: he inherited it.

BTW, I think most tort attorneys get to keep about 35-50%, not 60%. Bad enough that the exaggeration seems unnecessary.

Charlie Self "There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America." William J. Clinton

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Reply to
Charlie Self

Try self-employment. 15.3% for SS/medicare.

Charlie Self "There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America." William J. Clinton

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Reply to
Charlie Self

Reply to
Bill

I'd rather have that 15% go into my 401k.

Reply to
Bill

Sure will, or at least will look for the answer but please be specific in your question. Are you asking:

  1. what estimated rate of growth is the SS fund based on
  2. what is the actual growth rate?
  3. whether the econ prof is blowing wind up your skirt with his opinion that the crisis is manufatured by investment fund managers who'd love to get their hands on the re-directed funds?

Reply to
Kevin

those of us who collect paychecks by saying it is an "Employer" tax. They can't hide it from the self employed who are both the "employer" and the "employee".

Dave Hall

Reply to
David Hall

benefit stays the same as if you your employer paid half of that. I paid more in one year to SS than I had paid over about 12 previous years. Total tax on the last increment was a little over 51 percent including ss, Federal, and state income taxes (that's not a guess it was the actual percentage).

Reply to
George E. Cawthon

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