ron paul calls for end of soc sec

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

I suppose what I'm suggesting is that we first have to recognize that SS and the rest of the welfare state IS the problem and must be treated as such. It doesn't need to be tweaked or funded differently. It needs to be stopped.

That doesn't mean it has to be overnight. The best approach might be to ween society off these programs. If we make cuts in other areas, it might be possible sooner than expected.

That makes sense. Thanks.

[Starving Steve]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

Ron Paul is a RePUKE, and he even wants to destroy Social Security and Medicare and Obama-care. So, he is even more rightwing than a typical Republican. Not one word from Ron Paul about raising taxes to pay for anything, so he is typical of the Republicans. Not one word about taxing wasteful consumption nor doing-away with tax-breaks for the rich such as allowing the wealthy to deduct mortgage payments on their mansions from their taxable income.

It is one thing to chop bloated govn't that hurts people, for example: the Agriculture Department, the Defence Dept, the EPA, the Education Department, the grants to standardized timed-testers, the grants to solar energy junk from the Energy Dept, ethanol subsidies for millionaire farmers, all farm/ranch subsidies, the entire Federal Reserve Bank System, the DEA, the prison gulag, the IRS, the TARP, HUD, Fannie-May, and Freddie-Mac, just to name a few parts of the bloated government to chop; but it is quite another matter to chop Social Security, Medicare, and kill the Obama Health Reform Plan. So, I am very un-impressed with Ron Paul from Texas.

[Ghent12]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

Ron Paul is a RePUKE, and he even wants to destroy Social Security and Medicare and Obama-care. So, he is even more rightwing than a typical Republican. Not one word from Ron Paul about raising taxes to pay for anything, so he is typical of the Republicans. Not one word about taxing wasteful consumption nor doing-away with tax-breaks for the rich such as allowing the wealthy to deduct mortgage payments on their mansions from their taxable income.

It is one thing to chop bloated govn't that hurts people, for example: the Agriculture Department, the Defence Dept, the EPA, the Education Department, the grants to standardized timed-testers, the grants to solar energy junk from the Energy Dept, ethanol subsidies for millionaire farmers, all farm/ranch subsidies, the entire Federal Reserve Bank System, the DEA, the prison gulag, the IRS, the TARP, HUD, Fannie-May, and Freddie-Mac, just to name a few parts of the bloated government to chop; but it is quite another matter to chop Social Security, Medicare, and kill the Obama Health Reform Plan. So, I am very un-impressed with Ron Paul from Texas.

Ron Paul is a RINO if anything, and is a Constitutional Conservative / Libertarian.

[oddlots]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

There are a couple of things that I think need to be brought to bear on this problem.

One is to recognise that the role social security plays is an inevitable one: there has to be some system for any cohort in any society to effectively save for retirement. In more traditional societies this takes the form of having many children, an option obviously not available in aggregate to us. In fact the squeeze is on: as cow suggested, western nations face a gaping maw of payouts with declining earners to support it. But the situation is dire enough on it's face not to exaggerate it and what disturbs me is there seems to be an extreme lack of suspicion here about the huge prize this distortion has it's sights on.

One of the few real victories I saw during the Gilded (read gold foil) Age of the bush years was the defeat of the effort to privatise SS. The prize was enormous. Talk about a secure revenue stream. If Wall Street had a field day with the provision of shelter (read housing) just imagine how empty the coffers would be if that had passed! In fact it might eventually have presented a Dr Seuss worthy moment where the Grinch was actually caught stealing grannie's last can of cat food. Given the abominations of the bailouts - with no accountability for taxpayers (hey, when does that tea party start?) - you'd think some of us could project this Looting 2.0.

With notable exceptions, no one seems to beating this drum. Why?

[oddlots]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

Just a thought: why shouldn't those who paid into the system through SS be thought of as a senior creditors as in bankruptcy proceedings. The "welfare" label kind of seems unjust given that don't you think?

[tsetsefly]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

There are a couple of things that I think need to be brought to bear on this problem.

One is to recognise that the role social security plays is an inevitable one: there has to be some system for any cohort in any society to effectively save for retirement. In more traditional societies this takes the form of having many children, an option obviously not available in aggregate to us. In fact the squeeze is on: as cow suggested, western nations face a gaping maw of payouts with declining earners to support it. But the situation is dire enough on it's face not to exaggerate it and what disturbs me is there seems to be an extreme lack of suspicion here about the huge prize this distortion has it's sights on.

One of the few real victories I saw during the Gilded (read gold foil) Age of the bush years was the defeat of the effort to privatise SS. The prize was enormous. Talk about a secure revenue stream. If Wall Street had a field day with the provision of shelter (read housing) just imagine how empty the coffers would be if that had passed! In fact it might eventually have presented a Dr Seuss worthy moment where the Grinch was actually caught stealing grannie's last can of cat food. Given the abominations of the bailouts - with no accountability for taxpayers (hey, when does that tea party start?) - you'd think some of us could project this Looting 2.0.

With notable exceptions, no one seems to beating this drum. Why?

The solution is not privatizing social security by forcing people to put there money into FIRE. But give people the choice of doing whatever they want with their money, even sticking it under the mattress if that's what they want...

[DSpencer]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

Just a thought: why shouldn't those who paid into the system through SS be thought of as a senior creditors as in bankruptcy proceedings. The "welfare" label kind of seems unjust given that don't you think?

This probably isn't what you mean, but sounds interesting: Put SS into a liquidating bankruptcy. Take all the remaining assets in the SS "fund" and distribute them based on how much each person has "invested".

Of course the problem is that they already spent most of the "fund". The basic way it works is they tax people to pay out a benefit to somebody else. How is that different than welfare? Most of the people on "regular" welfare could probably claim to have paid into the system at some point in time. Does that mean that they are really just creditors of the welfare system collecting what's owed to them?

It seems fair to me to call the SS program a welfare program, albeit one with a plan and schedule that has widespread forced participation.

If when (if?) I retire, the SS program is totally depleted and I never receive anything back, can we then retroactively define it as a welfare program?

I would guess that your main issue with defining it as welfare has more to do with the connotations surrounding the word welfare and not with the definition of welfare.

[Starving Steve]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

Ron Paul is a RINO if anything, and is a Constitutional Conservative / Libertarian.

When are the so-called, "Constitutional Conservatives" going to talk about paying the bills for the deficits, and stop mouthing meaningless and vague terms about "gold", "faith", "full-faith and trust", "returning to the Constitution", "the Founders meant", "growth", "grow the pie", "deficits don't count", "returning to capitalism", "free markets", "checks and balances in govn't", "consumption means growth", "America's consumer economy is the engine of world growth", "supply-side economics", etc?

Paying the bills for deficits means pain, austerity, cutting, chopping, sacrifice, saving, taxing, efficiency, producing, exporting, paying China (and the rest of the world) with a rising dollar, higher interest rates, gold, oil, land, and tangible products.

I shouldn't just pick-on Ron Paul and his Republicans from the South, because both Demos and the Republicans in the U.S. need to get this message, loud and clear. Twenty years of hell lie ahead for America, and that is the medicine for the lunacy of deficit-spending and bubble-economics..... Higher-taxes are ahead, not lower-taxes. Consumption-taxes are ahead, as part of the solution for budget deficits inherited from the past.

[Serge_Tomiko]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

I agree with you to a large extent.

What are you suggesting however? Are you suggesting that because the system we have now is morally wrong, fundamentally flawed and weak, that therefore it should be removed forthwith?

That is obviously what is necessary.

As I attempted to outline in a previous post, it WILL be replaced. What we call culture - the shared values, language, world view, and social activities of a people - is what existed before the advent of modern liberal democracy. That is how humans organized society and maximized social order and survival, before the vast bureaucratic enterprises that now control every aspect of our lives.

Those systems however are temporary and cannot continue.

You're a smart guy Cow. I've always liked your posts on this site. I would suggest a fine book written by an associate of mine, it is titled The Tyranny of Liberalism: Understanding and Overcoming Administered Freedom, Inquisitorial Tolerance, and Equality by Command..

He, like you, is on the older side and doesn't seem to share the pressing desire for an immediate traditionalist revolution such as that which I advocate, but reading the book will help you understand that this system of society is at least doomed for failure.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

That is obviously what is necessary.

Are you saying that it is necessary to remove the social security system sometime, or that it is necessary to remove it right now, forthwith, immediately?

If we remove it right now, that does great and immoral harm to many poor old people depending on it to eat. It would be, speaking bluntly, genocidal murder.

I hope you are not suggesting we should cancel all Social Security payments immediately.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

this system of society is at least doomed for failure.

Yes, no doubt.

What we are determining now, by our actions, is whether this demise shall quick or slow, and whether it shall end in another dark age or a new enlightened era.

That looks like a good book - thanks for the link.

[rabot10]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

You have some good points there.

It used to be that families and neighbors did watch out for each other. Communities were strong; most of your siblings and cousins, their parents and children, lived within walking distance, or at least an easy horse ride. You helped each other out.

Much of this traditional cohesiveness has been destroyed in modern day society. It would be immoral to destroy traditional community and family support, without providing a semblance of a replacement.

We do have a problem funding Social Security however, or funding any form of modest living for many people, in a collapsing economy.

When I was in my peak Baby Boomer earning years, there were six of us funding the Social Security of one person such as my mother, who grew up in the Great Depression, never held a fancy job and lived dirt cheap on a meager Social Security check. Such payments did not present a great tax burden.

As I joke to my son (he doesn't find it funny -- I wonder why) soon there will be only two people like him paying my Social Security check, and with my high wage earnings for decades, that's one fine check each month. I tell him he'd better start working really hard to pay his half of my Social Security. Meanwhile, he's bouncing from one part time, low paying job to another.

Something is seriously broken with that picture.

The biggest problem in my view is Medicare, not Social Security. I agree with your post that we should have a limited social security program (nevermind my post to the contrary just above.) But the U.S. medical system is seriously all dorked up.

Hey I don’t think that I’m the sharpest tack in the box, but this whole SS thing comes down to simple math IMHO. It’s really simple math – how do we pay out 80K to someone that only sent in 20K?? I don’t care how you look at it the math does not add up. Am I missing something?

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

how do we pay out 80K to someone that only sent in 20K??

Well, there are also those who send in 80K and get back 20K, if that. Black men, out of various possible groups, get one of the shortest ends of the stick. They work most of their lives, sometimes paying in more in FICA (Social Security) than in income tax (especially when you consider the employer's matching "contribution"), only to die, on average, not long after they retire.

Sure (even given that some pay in more than they get) the numbers don't add up. But that's not a big deal. If we stopped all Federal programs that were not self-funding, we wouldn't have much of a Federal government left (hmmm ... I should think about that possibility further.)

[Ghent12]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

When are the so-called, "Constitutional Conservatives" going to talk about paying the bills for the deficits, and stop mouthing meaningless and vague terms about "gold", "faith", "full-faith and trust", "returning to the Constitution", "the Founders meant", "growth", "grow the pie", "deficits don't count", "returning to capitalism", "free markets", "checks and balances in govn't", "consumption means growth", "America's consumer economy is the engine of world growth", "supply-side economics", etc?

Paying the bills for deficits means pain, austerity, cutting, chopping, sacrifice, saving, taxing, efficiency, producing, exporting, paying China (and the rest of the world) with a rising dollar, higher interest rates, gold, oil, land, and tangible products.

I shouldn't just pick-on Ron Paul and his Republicans from the South, because both Demos and the Republicans in the U.S. need to get this message, loud and clear. Twenty years of hell lie ahead for America, and that is the medicine for the lunacy of deficit-spending and bubble-economics..... Higher-taxes are ahead, not lower-taxes. Consumption-taxes are ahead, as part of the solution for budget deficits inherited from the past.

You are mixing Ron Paul in with messages that he has never said and are the antithesis of his position, especially with regards to "deficits don't count," "consumption means growth," "America's consumer economy is the engine of world growth," and "supply-side economics." His platform is the very epitome of advocacy for a balanced budget and paying your bills without deficits. His platform is about lower spending overall, which you may not agree with especially with regards to social programs, but don't try to paint him as a bill-dodging Repuke.

[Roughneck]

Re: ron paul calls for end of soc sec

No one wants to cut grannys ss payments in half,but if the fed tanks the dollar and it declines 50% then it's the same thing.