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Even if such promises were made and indeed kept for some people at no point that I am aware of was the situation ever long term stable. AFAIK Soviet Union guara

Even if such promises were made and indeed kept for some people at no point that I am aware of was the situation ever long term stable. AFAIK Soviet Union guaranteed dignity in retirement and planned to not have to pay for it through achieving a post-monetary society. The US made similar guarantees and planed to out-grow the costs (i.e. ponzi scheme).

danans 2y ago
> The US made similar guarantees and planed to out-grow the costs (i.e. ponzi scheme). If you're referring to Social Security in the US, it's no more a Ponzi scheme than your home mortgage payment is a Ponzi scheme. In reality it's a progressive tax scheme to prevent senior citizen poverty. To make Social Security solvent, lift the cap on Social Security taxes. Will the working and middle classes benefit more than the wealthy who will pay more in those taxes? Yes, and progressive taxation to prevent abject impoverishment of working and middle class seniors is a good thing.
- cjbgkagh 2y ago
  The US would still need to outgrow its other problems if the US in general is to remain solvent. I am pretty doubtful that it can.
  - alabastervlog 2y ago
    Yeah, the two rounds of huge tax cuts since our last semi-balanced budget really screwed us. As they were predicted to.
    - cjbgkagh 2y ago
      That and danans 'one thing' seems rather simplistic / reductive. My view is the degradation of the US has been many things over a long time and we're lucky things lasted as long as they have been.
      - danans 2y ago
        > That and danans 'one thing' seems rather simplistic / reductive OK. Let's add some things. Free public schools, subsidized public universities, subsidized public vocational colleges, Medicare. All can be funded if we reverse the tens of trillions of wealth that we have channeled upwards with tax cuts for the wealthy and cut taxes for the working class.
        cjbgkagh 2y ago
        ‘We’? Good luck with that. At least Tankies are honest about the degree of coercion required to get a population to agree on things.
        PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
        It is clear from your comments here that you're a very cynical person when it comes to national government. Perhaps that is blinding you to the fairly well-known fact that during the period most extolled by conservatives as the golden age of American history (*), upper marginal rates were in the 70-92% range, without much disagreement except for a few people who leveraged their wealth into (Reagan's) political power. Most people didn't see anything wrong with those rates back then, and most surveys even today show Americans in very large numbers in favor of a much more egalitarian distribution of wealth than exists (they also think it is much more egalitarian than it actually is). (*) yes, ok, so in reality some of them want to go back to 1890 or even earlier, but I'm trying to focus on a more mainstream conservative attitude.
        cjbgkagh 2y ago
        There are governments I do like, it is possible to govern well. I just think it's facile to work under the assumption that the answer is simple. That one simple change will take the US from point A to B. The US has radically changed from the 1950s and the idea that one simple change of a 92% top marginal tax rate will make it economically the 1950s again is completely preposterous.
  - throwaway2037 2y ago
    The US is essentially the fastest growing rich non-microstate country in the world. If US cannot do it, then I guess that you also believe all other highly developed nations with large social safety nets will become insolvent?

danans 2y ago

> The US made similar guarantees and planed to out-grow the costs (i.e. ponzi scheme). If you're referring to Social Security in the US, it's no more a Ponzi scheme than your home mortgage payment is a Ponzi scheme. In reality it's a progressive tax scheme to prevent senior citizen poverty. To make Social Security solvent, lift the cap on Social Security taxes. Will the working and middle classes benefit more than the wealthy who will pay more in those taxes? Yes, and progressive taxation to prevent abject impoverishment of working and middle class seniors is a good thing.

cjbgkagh 2y ago
The US would still need to outgrow its other problems if the US in general is to remain solvent. I am pretty doubtful that it can.
- alabastervlog 2y ago
  Yeah, the two rounds of huge tax cuts since our last semi-balanced budget really screwed us. As they were predicted to.
  - cjbgkagh 2y ago
    That and danans 'one thing' seems rather simplistic / reductive. My view is the degradation of the US has been many things over a long time and we're lucky things lasted as long as they have been.
    - danans 2y ago
      > That and danans 'one thing' seems rather simplistic / reductive OK. Let's add some things. Free public schools, subsidized public universities, subsidized public vocational colleges, Medicare. All can be funded if we reverse the tens of trillions of wealth that we have channeled upwards with tax cuts for the wealthy and cut taxes for the working class.
      - cjbgkagh 2y ago
        ‘We’? Good luck with that. At least Tankies are honest about the degree of coercion required to get a population to agree on things.
        PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
        It is clear from your comments here that you're a very cynical person when it comes to national government. Perhaps that is blinding you to the fairly well-known fact that during the period most extolled by conservatives as the golden age of American history (*), upper marginal rates were in the 70-92% range, without much disagreement except for a few people who leveraged their wealth into (Reagan's) political power. Most people didn't see anything wrong with those rates back then, and most surveys even today show Americans in very large numbers in favor of a much more egalitarian distribution of wealth than exists (they also think it is much more egalitarian than it actually is). (*) yes, ok, so in reality some of them want to go back to 1890 or even earlier, but I'm trying to focus on a more mainstream conservative attitude.
        cjbgkagh 2y ago
        There are governments I do like, it is possible to govern well. I just think it's facile to work under the assumption that the answer is simple. That one simple change will take the US from point A to B. The US has radically changed from the 1950s and the idea that one simple change of a 92% top marginal tax rate will make it economically the 1950s again is completely preposterous.
- throwaway2037 2y ago
  The US is essentially the fastest growing rich non-microstate country in the world. If US cannot do it, then I guess that you also believe all other highly developed nations with large social safety nets will become insolvent?