6 ms·

This is why he (and other billionaires) are pining to get Social Security replaced with an indexed based retirement fund?

jmuguy 5mo ago
Who knows, I mean it would certainly make it easier for them to turn the entire population into their bag holders. Don't even have to hype the company any more or spin up a bunch of bullshit about space.
funimpoded 5mo ago
Absolutely, that's the main reason there's been a push for that for decades. It's a giant pile of poor people's money that rich people can't easily skim from, and they'd really, really like to. Once it's "in the market" they gain all kinds of options for turning some of that money into their money, some immediately, some with tweaks to laws or policy.
- trunkiedozer 5mo ago
  That’s literally not how it works. You buy a share of stock and participate in their gains. For example, I owned a bunch of Tesla stock since around 2017. Now I have a ton in the stock as well as a new house and a model s plaid thanks to their greatness. Did the same with Apple, that is my retirement and travel fund. it ain’t hard.
  - funimpoded 5mo ago
    > You buy a share of stock and participate in their gains That is "literally not how it works", as you missed "... and losses". Since dividends aren't really a thing any more and gains are ~100% from stock prices increasing, existing holders of securities would really like a bunch more money to come shopping and drive that price up. Very helpful if you want to make sure a period where "... and losses" seems like a silly thing to be worried about keeps going for a while longer. Bunch of folks out there would love to be taking management fees on funds that're required by law to receive 10ish% of every middle-class-and-under working American's paycheck (some at the higher end of the pay scale pay less than that, because of the cutoff, and of course anyone rich enough not to have wage income pays no FICA at all). Others would like to game the system to make Social Security a huge, deep-pocketed buyer for their scams. This is for when "... and losses" starts really biting people.
    - trunkiedozer 5mo ago
      Your theory vs my reality bro
  - doubleg72 5mo ago
    Yeah sure, cool story bro.
    - trunkiedozer 5mo ago
      Keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll keep getting what you got. I’m living large bro. Good luck to you.
lotsofpulp 5mo ago
I am a non billionaire and I would prefer Social Security to go away. Mathematically, there is no alternative to the purchasing power of my Social Security benefits being reduced, simply due to the changes in the population age histogram. It has to become more and more of a wealth transfer from the working to non working, which means my kids will benefit less and less from their work.
WarmWash 5mo ago
Pretty much everyone already has an index based retirement fund.
- outside1234 5mo ago
  The reason we have social security like it is is twofold: 1) current retirees are paid directly from our contributions. There is no pot of money to be invested and 2) we want to be able to guarantee a defined benefit that is not below a certain number. You can't do that with the market.
  - WarmWash 5mo ago
    Between the pyramid scheme nature of social security, the high inflation potential of the USD, and the ability for politicians to leverage social security for short term approval boosts You definitely can't do it with the government either...
elevation 5mo ago
> Social Security replaced with an index Yes please! I learned just how bad of a deal Social Security is when an employer (a bootstrapped startup) offered a predatory 401k plan. It was free for my employer to setup but the employees were stuck with extremely high fees. It was so bad that John Oliver made an episode[0] about it! Yet, even for the worst 401K plan in America, the projected retirement returns were 1600% of the Social Security returns. Even America's worst 401K would be better for the average consumer than the federal debacle Uncle Sam should sunset SSI and allow citizens to select from and move freely between a number of accredited funds. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvZSpET11ZY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvZSpET11ZY
- altcognito 5mo ago
  Are you aware that SSI is an insurance (or lifetime annuity) not an investment? SSI covers disability, and supplements income no matter what happens. Disability? You're covered. Live to 105? You're covered. Market dips 50% in a period you have a lot of expenses? Your benefits are unaffected. Tax advantaged 401k is already the vehicle of choice for retirement funds.
  - Ajedi32 5mo ago
    1600% higher returns can cover a lot of eventualities.
    - compsciphd 5mo ago
      it doesn't cover you getting disabled so you can't work anymore at the age of 30 after working 8 years. 1600% higher return is great when you work from yours 20s to your 50s/60s and can essentially self insure yourself at that point with it, but as the person you are responding to you is (I believe) trying to say, that's not everyone.
      - Ajedi32 5mo ago
        Fair, but given that we're talking about a hypothetical government program, "index-based retirement fund" doesn't imply you're the only one contributing to said fund.
outside1234 5mo ago
Not sure why you are getting downvoted. This is exactly right. They want a constant source of buying that they can steer investments into.
kristofferR 5mo ago
Not to mention that they always harp on it being supposedly unsustainable and insolvent, while deliberately not mentioning that it is solely because the social security is the most regressive tax, where the more you earn the lower your rate. If it was a flat tax where everyone paid the same percentage of instead of a regressive tax where only working people pay the rate, then social security would be well funded. Obviously they don’t want to pay the same tax rate as working people, so theyd rather get rid of social security instead.
- lotsofpulp 5mo ago
  This is not correct. For people who earn less than the SS wage cap ($184.5k in 2026), Social Security is a progressive tax due to the bend points in the benefit formula. You explicitly get less benefit for each additional dollar you pay in tax. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/cola/bendpoints.html https://www.ssa.gov/oact/cola/bendpoints.html But every dollar of income earned over the SS wage cap reduces effective tax rate. The more you earn, the less the effective Social Security tax rate is for you. At Elon Musk levels, it rounds down to zero. Therefore, there would be no motivation for super rich people to get rid of social security. The only material reduction in tax rate would be for those relying on annual earned income of a few hundred thousand dollars or less (i.e. the bottom 95% of income earners).
  - kristofferR 5mo ago
    That's what I'm saying, they pretend that the only way to fix SS is to cut services/replace it, because actually fixing it without cuts would involve removing the lobbyhole/cap that makes their rate close to zero.
trunkiedozer 5mo ago
Way better returns when you take charge of your investments rather than bitching about the government, anyone can be a millionaire with minimal effort, just being smart.

jmuguy 5mo ago

Who knows, I mean it would certainly make it easier for them to turn the entire population into their bag holders. Don't even have to hype the company any more or spin up a bunch of bullshit about space.

funimpoded 5mo ago

Absolutely, that's the main reason there's been a push for that for decades. It's a giant pile of poor people's money that rich people can't easily skim from, and they'd really, really like to. Once it's "in the market" they gain all kinds of options for turning some of that money into their money, some immediately, some with tweaks to laws or policy.

trunkiedozer 5mo ago
That’s literally not how it works. You buy a share of stock and participate in their gains. For example, I owned a bunch of Tesla stock since around 2017. Now I have a ton in the stock as well as a new house and a model s plaid thanks to their greatness. Did the same with Apple, that is my retirement and travel fund. it ain’t hard.
- funimpoded 5mo ago
  > You buy a share of stock and participate in their gains That is "literally not how it works", as you missed "... and losses". Since dividends aren't really a thing any more and gains are ~100% from stock prices increasing, existing holders of securities would really like a bunch more money to come shopping and drive that price up. Very helpful if you want to make sure a period where "... and losses" seems like a silly thing to be worried about keeps going for a while longer. Bunch of folks out there would love to be taking management fees on funds that're required by law to receive 10ish% of every middle-class-and-under working American's paycheck (some at the higher end of the pay scale pay less than that, because of the cutoff, and of course anyone rich enough not to have wage income pays no FICA at all). Others would like to game the system to make Social Security a huge, deep-pocketed buyer for their scams. This is for when "... and losses" starts really biting people.
  - trunkiedozer 5mo ago
    Your theory vs my reality bro
- doubleg72 5mo ago
  Yeah sure, cool story bro.
  - trunkiedozer 5mo ago
    Keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll keep getting what you got. I’m living large bro. Good luck to you.

lotsofpulp 5mo ago

I am a non billionaire and I would prefer Social Security to go away. Mathematically, there is no alternative to the purchasing power of my Social Security benefits being reduced, simply due to the changes in the population age histogram. It has to become more and more of a wealth transfer from the working to non working, which means my kids will benefit less and less from their work.

WarmWash 5mo ago

Pretty much everyone already has an index based retirement fund.

outside1234 5mo ago
The reason we have social security like it is is twofold: 1) current retirees are paid directly from our contributions. There is no pot of money to be invested and 2) we want to be able to guarantee a defined benefit that is not below a certain number. You can't do that with the market.
- WarmWash 5mo ago
  Between the pyramid scheme nature of social security, the high inflation potential of the USD, and the ability for politicians to leverage social security for short term approval boosts You definitely can't do it with the government either...

elevation 5mo ago

> Social Security replaced with an index Yes please! I learned just how bad of a deal Social Security is when an employer (a bootstrapped startup) offered a predatory 401k plan. It was free for my employer to setup but the employees were stuck with extremely high fees. It was so bad that John Oliver made an episode[0] about it! Yet, even for the worst 401K plan in America, the projected retirement returns were 1600% of the Social Security returns. Even America's worst 401K would be better for the average consumer than the federal debacle Uncle Sam should sunset SSI and allow citizens to select from and move freely between a number of accredited funds. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvZSpET11ZY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvZSpET11ZY

altcognito 5mo ago
Are you aware that SSI is an insurance (or lifetime annuity) not an investment? SSI covers disability, and supplements income no matter what happens. Disability? You're covered. Live to 105? You're covered. Market dips 50% in a period you have a lot of expenses? Your benefits are unaffected. Tax advantaged 401k is already the vehicle of choice for retirement funds.
- Ajedi32 5mo ago
  1600% higher returns can cover a lot of eventualities.
  - compsciphd 5mo ago
    it doesn't cover you getting disabled so you can't work anymore at the age of 30 after working 8 years. 1600% higher return is great when you work from yours 20s to your 50s/60s and can essentially self insure yourself at that point with it, but as the person you are responding to you is (I believe) trying to say, that's not everyone.
    - Ajedi32 5mo ago
      Fair, but given that we're talking about a hypothetical government program, "index-based retirement fund" doesn't imply you're the only one contributing to said fund.

outside1234 5mo ago

Not sure why you are getting downvoted. This is exactly right. They want a constant source of buying that they can steer investments into.

kristofferR 5mo ago

Not to mention that they always harp on it being supposedly unsustainable and insolvent, while deliberately not mentioning that it is solely because the social security is the most regressive tax, where the more you earn the lower your rate. If it was a flat tax where everyone paid the same percentage of instead of a regressive tax where only working people pay the rate, then social security would be well funded. Obviously they don’t want to pay the same tax rate as working people, so theyd rather get rid of social security instead.

lotsofpulp 5mo ago
This is not correct. For people who earn less than the SS wage cap ($184.5k in 2026), Social Security is a progressive tax due to the bend points in the benefit formula. You explicitly get less benefit for each additional dollar you pay in tax. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/cola/bendpoints.html https://www.ssa.gov/oact/cola/bendpoints.html But every dollar of income earned over the SS wage cap reduces effective tax rate. The more you earn, the less the effective Social Security tax rate is for you. At Elon Musk levels, it rounds down to zero. Therefore, there would be no motivation for super rich people to get rid of social security. The only material reduction in tax rate would be for those relying on annual earned income of a few hundred thousand dollars or less (i.e. the bottom 95% of income earners).
- kristofferR 5mo ago
  That's what I'm saying, they pretend that the only way to fix SS is to cut services/replace it, because actually fixing it without cuts would involve removing the lobbyhole/cap that makes their rate close to zero.

trunkiedozer 5mo ago

Way better returns when you take charge of your investments rather than bitching about the government, anyone can be a millionaire with minimal effort, just being smart.