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Right, SS is already in a risky position, most millenials question if it'll even be standing when it comes to their turn (especially if population drops since t

by surge 7y ago

Right, SS is already in a risky position, most millenials question if it'll even be standing when it comes to their turn (especially if population drops since they're having less children who will pay in), what they're suggesting would make it worse.

rlt 7y ago
Well... it's a morbid thought, but if COVID-19 kills a large number of old people quickly, maybe SS will work itself out (FWIW it was my elderly dad who pointed this out to me) Related: according to Twitter, kids are starting to call COVID-19 the "boomer remover" https://twitter.com/BaileyCarlin/status/1238147875143647234 https://twitter.com/BaileyCarlin/status/1238147875143647234
thawaway1837 7y ago
Yeah, except that’s not true at all. SS is not in a risky position. The worst that can happen to it is current SS receipts do not pay out enough money for the current SS recipients to live a reasonable quality of life. SS is a transfer of funds from current earners to current retirees. People trying to scare people about SS talk about the trust fund depleting, but the trust fund is simply a bonus that was created to account for the fact that when the baby boomers started retiring, their numbers would be much greater than the numbers of working people to maintain a healthy SS system. So they set aside some additional money so the large number of baby boomers, who in their prime had to pay for a relatively smaller number of retirees, were paying some money towards their own retirement and so wouldn’t place too much of a burden when they retired.
- toomuchtodo 7y ago
  Thanks for injecting some sanity into this. Benefits drop to about 75% when the trust fund is exhausted around 2026, and we'd simply need to take the salary cap off Social Security taxes and possible transfer some monies from the general fund. It's an entirely solvable political problem.
- jfengel 7y ago
  "Set aside" is a funny way to put it. They "set it aside" in US Treasury bonds, causing a massive growth in the US government -- who still managed to run a deficit on top of that because they also cut taxes. That artificially boosted the GDP in a way that made a few people much richer while leaving everybody else flat at best. Now, their children inherit an oversized government that they must either cut or pay for with a big tax hike. The people who pocketed that money have resisted any attempt to put the tax burden on them, and indeed, have demanded more and more tax cuts. The next generation is thus not only paying for their parents' retirements, as per the Social Security social contract, but also financing their parents' massive debt. The Social Security Trust Fund helped enable that by making a massive government debt seem smaller than it would otherwise have been.

by surge 7y ago

rlt 7y ago

Well... it's a morbid thought, but if COVID-19 kills a large number of old people quickly, maybe SS will work itself out (FWIW it was my elderly dad who pointed this out to me) Related: according to Twitter, kids are starting to call COVID-19 the "boomer remover" https://twitter.com/BaileyCarlin/status/1238147875143647234 https://twitter.com/BaileyCarlin/status/1238147875143647234

thawaway1837 7y ago

Yeah, except that’s not true at all. SS is not in a risky position. The worst that can happen to it is current SS receipts do not pay out enough money for the current SS recipients to live a reasonable quality of life. SS is a transfer of funds from current earners to current retirees. People trying to scare people about SS talk about the trust fund depleting, but the trust fund is simply a bonus that was created to account for the fact that when the baby boomers started retiring, their numbers would be much greater than the numbers of working people to maintain a healthy SS system. So they set aside some additional money so the large number of baby boomers, who in their prime had to pay for a relatively smaller number of retirees, were paying some money towards their own retirement and so wouldn’t place too much of a burden when they retired.

toomuchtodo 7y ago
Thanks for injecting some sanity into this. Benefits drop to about 75% when the trust fund is exhausted around 2026, and we'd simply need to take the salary cap off Social Security taxes and possible transfer some monies from the general fund. It's an entirely solvable political problem.
jfengel 7y ago
"Set aside" is a funny way to put it. They "set it aside" in US Treasury bonds, causing a massive growth in the US government -- who still managed to run a deficit on top of that because they also cut taxes. That artificially boosted the GDP in a way that made a few people much richer while leaving everybody else flat at best. Now, their children inherit an oversized government that they must either cut or pay for with a big tax hike. The people who pocketed that money have resisted any attempt to put the tax burden on them, and indeed, have demanded more and more tax cuts. The next generation is thus not only paying for their parents' retirements, as per the Social Security social contract, but also financing their parents' massive debt. The Social Security Trust Fund helped enable that by making a massive government debt seem smaller than it would otherwise have been.