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> In a private system they have the capability of accumulating generational wealth. In the public system they do not. How sure are you about this? "Social Sec

> In a private system they have the capability of accumulating generational wealth. In the public system they do not. How sure are you about this? "Social Security already provides an inheritance benefit in the form of survivors benefits, which account for nearly one-fifth of all benefits that Social Security pays. When a worker dies, Social Security pays survivors benefits for a number of years to the worker’s minor children as well as to the worker’s spouse if the spouse is raising children who are under 16 or the spouse is 60 or older.[1] The Social Security actuaries have reported that for a typical family with two young children in which a worker dies before reaching retirement age, the survivors benefits can be the equivalent of inheriting $400,000, a much larger sum than most workers could accumulate in a private account." https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security-and-inheritance https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security-and-inheritanc... > Or is your goal to keep them under your thumb, poor, and beholden to the state? Do you really want to bring questions about our motives into the scope of discussion? I don't usually find that a productive line of conversation. And at this point, looking back over the discussion, what do you think a perceptive audience is more likely to believe: that my goal is sinister enslavement via social security check, or that your championing of an entirely privatized retirement system owes more to some other motive than concern for the struggles of manual laborers? > My preference would be to remove the FICA from the rest of your income, bringing income taxes and capital gains taxes into parity. FICA taxes don't have to be gospel. The question is how you're going to replace the revenue they provide for Social Security and Medicare, or if not that, with the opportunity that revenue funds. Perhaps you could do it by raising long term capital gains taxes. But if the line of discussion points towards elimination of those programs, well, so far, I haven't seen any credible evidence or argument that if we eliminate SS+MC, the people for whom those specific taxes turn out to be regressive would have the opportunity to get a hold of a vehicle that would provide better benefits/returns, not to mention the balance of incentives to put money into it. I think it's likely enough concerns about any regressive side to those taxes are better addressed by considering how the rest of the income tax code is (or might be) progressive and in the quality of the public benefits. Or bringing the bracket system to that side. Or holidays like the one in Tax Relief Act of 2010. Really, there's a lot of tools in the box.

Consultant32452 9y ago
Social security pays survivor's benefits to your minor children... How many 65+ year olds have minor children? Basically none. And the other straw man your article argues against is private account plans that are basically loans taken against your future social security benefits. I'm talking about not participating in social security at all. >that my goal is sinister enslavement via social security check, or that your championing of an entirely privatized retirement system owes more to some other motive than concern for the struggles of manual laborers? How a reader is biased before coming into the conversation is irrelevant. I'll ask again, since you dodged it. Are you open to plans that would allow the poor to accumulate private wealth that they can pass onto their children? I'll give you a pass that you probably don't think your actions are part of what's keeping them poor. However, keeping them under your thumb and beholden to the state is simply an objective fact of the system if you won't allow them to opt out. >The question is how you're going to replace the revenue they provide for Social Security and Medicare Why would I want to replace the revenue? There's lots of ways to handle phasing out the program, but you could simply freeze the nominal value of the payouts and let inflation eat away at it until it's cheap to just pay off any remaining outstanding benefits and shut it down. While that's going on you can issue a dividend refund for however much excess the program collects. >I haven't seen any credible evidence or argument that if we eliminate SS+MC, the people for whom those specific taxes turn out to be regressive would have the opportunity to get a hold of a vehicle that would provide better benefits/returns, not to mention the balance of incentives to put money into it. Buying a bunch of useless shit that your kids sell at a yard sale after you die that makes a few hundred bucks is a better return on investment than the 100% loss many of the poor get today because they die too early to receive any benefits at all. Your answer to that was that if the 60-year old who dies has a 5 year old they'll get a payout... I mean seriously... A person/family making $35k/yr from 21 to 65 needs to only put away 6% of their income and earn the historical 401k average of 5% to have 100% of their working years annual income in retirement income to the age of 80. The bottom 40% of US income has a life expectancy of 80 or less. And that's putting under half their current FICA (15%) into a retirement account. Also incidentally, that's nearly 50% better than than the SS payout in your James Russel article. Will there be some unfortunate people who were disabled or spent an inordinate amount of time with a household income of less than 2/3 the median household income? Or perhaps some low income people who beat the odds and live to 90? Absolutely. If 90% of us want to pitch in to help the bottom 10%, I'm happy to do so.

Consultant32452 9y ago

Social security pays survivor's benefits to your minor children... How many 65+ year olds have minor children? Basically none. And the other straw man your article argues against is private account plans that are basically loans taken against your future social security benefits. I'm talking about not participating in social security at all. >that my goal is sinister enslavement via social security check, or that your championing of an entirely privatized retirement system owes more to some other motive than concern for the struggles of manual laborers? How a reader is biased before coming into the conversation is irrelevant. I'll ask again, since you dodged it. Are you open to plans that would allow the poor to accumulate private wealth that they can pass onto their children? I'll give you a pass that you probably don't think your actions are part of what's keeping them poor. However, keeping them under your thumb and beholden to the state is simply an objective fact of the system if you won't allow them to opt out. >The question is how you're going to replace the revenue they provide for Social Security and Medicare Why would I want to replace the revenue? There's lots of ways to handle phasing out the program, but you could simply freeze the nominal value of the payouts and let inflation eat away at it until it's cheap to just pay off any remaining outstanding benefits and shut it down. While that's going on you can issue a dividend refund for however much excess the program collects. >I haven't seen any credible evidence or argument that if we eliminate SS+MC, the people for whom those specific taxes turn out to be regressive would have the opportunity to get a hold of a vehicle that would provide better benefits/returns, not to mention the balance of incentives to put money into it. Buying a bunch of useless shit that your kids sell at a yard sale after you die that makes a few hundred bucks is a better return on investment than the 100% loss many of the poor get today because they die too early to receive any benefits at all. Your answer to that was that if the 60-year old who dies has a 5 year old they'll get a payout... I mean seriously... A person/family making $35k/yr from 21 to 65 needs to only put away 6% of their income and earn the historical 401k average of 5% to have 100% of their working years annual income in retirement income to the age of 80. The bottom 40% of US income has a life expectancy of 80 or less. And that's putting under half their current FICA (15%) into a retirement account. Also incidentally, that's nearly 50% better than than the SS payout in your James Russel article. Will there be some unfortunate people who were disabled or spent an inordinate amount of time with a household income of less than 2/3 the median household income? Or perhaps some low income people who beat the odds and live to 90? Absolutely. If 90% of us want to pitch in to help the bottom 10%, I'm happy to do so.