Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, my 90 year old mother's hero, even as she despioses Obama) set upSocial Security as a SELF-FUNDING RETIREMENT PROGRRAM, where EVERYONE contributes to the program (supposedly, except for people 65 at the time it was strated) , and EVERYONE receives retirement benefits form the program. Unlike the income tax, Social Security funding was set up like a REAL retirement plan, where ALL workers contribute not only the same percentate of their earned income to the program, but the FUNDING is LIMITED so that some people ("the rich") do not pay a MASSIVE amount more into the program than they ever can hope to 'recover". In other words, you onlly "contribute" to the program on earned income up to around $100,0000, and (unlike the Medicarfe tax) do not pay a "Social Security tax" on ALL income (which would make Social Security a massive WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION program, as would "paying for' Social Seucirty out of the progessive INCOME TAC.
Ino other words, Social Security was NOT set up--for the future, anyway, except for the relatively small number of initial retirees) as a WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION ptogram. However, since FDR we hae steadily moved Social Security more and more toward being solely a wealth redistributiohn/welfare program, rahter than the SELF-FUNDING "retirement program" it was supposed to be. FDR's iea was that Americans did not WANT a wealth redistributin program, but wanted a RETIREMENT program where they cuuld feel they were ALL comntgritubing to a retirment program for ALL. FDR's idea was that the only way to get Social Security passed, and to have it survive in the long term, was to have it be a REITREMETN PROGRAM FOR ALL, rather than just another government "relief"/welfare progrram. FDR was right, but Obama and ohhter leftist Democras (including leftist media and too many GOP estalbishment peole) WANT Social Seucirty to be just another mssive wealth redistributin program/welfare program funded by "the rich". They WANT Social Security to be FUNDEd by the PROGRESSIVE income tax, which would destory Social Seucirty as FDR set it up. It will be the beginning of the end for Social Security, and lprobably for this country. Once Social Secuirty turns into merely a MASSIVE welath redistributgin prgram, instad of the MILD one it presently is where the IDEA has baeen maintained that EVEYONE pays into the probram not TOO disproportionately to what they can expect to get out.
Problem, as my brother, the accountant, pints out: Social Security was set up WRONG. No, the concept is not wrong of what amounts to a fORCED retirement program where everyone is forced to contribute part of their wages to a retirement plan. But if a PRIVATE employer set up a RETIREMENT plan like Social Security, as my brotehr pointed out when he was co-owenr of a bussiness, that private employer would GO TO JAIL. That is because Social Security (as Rick Perry said) is set up as a PONZI SCHEME, instead of as a real retirment program.
Do the "contributions" (Social Security taxes you and your employer pay into the Social Seucirty program) go to fund our OWN retirment? If you knoow anything, you know that this is NOT SO. Your "contributins" to the retirement program go to FUND the BENEFIT PAYMENTS TO CURRENT RETIREES. This is the very definition of a Ponzi sschem, where "contributions" from present "contributors" into the scheme do not go into a rEAL ACCOUNT for the contributors, but go to pay off PRESENT DISTRIBUTEES (for as lng as possible). Thus, your "contributions" to Social Secuirty do NOT go to fund a PERSONAL RETIREMENT ACCOUNT, with the money being "invested" for YOU . Your contirbuitns give you NOTHING but a "promise' to give yu SOME KIND of "retirment benefits" in the future, whikle the acutal money goes to PRFESENT RETIREES. It is actauly wore than that. You cannot ENFORCE the government "promise". In other words, the GOVERNMENT does regard the Social Secuirty prtram as a government program--not a true retirment plan with "esting" and all of the rest--where the government has thePOWER to REDUCE or CUT OFF benefits.
You can see what is wrong here. Since you have no OWNERSHIOP interest in a RETIREMENT ACCOUNT or RETIRMENT PLAN which you can ENFORCE, it is easy for peole like Obama, leftist Democrats--incluidng the leftist media--and others to regard Social Seucrity as jsut another government program funded by TAXES (like any other taxes--rather than being CONTRIBUTINS toward a retirment plan aht is self-funding). My accountant brother even fell into this trap: the accountanmt idea that money is "fungible", and that money taken from you by the Federal Gvoernment represents TAXES like any other tases. Now it is true that you can regard Social Seucrity as NOT a self-funding rETIREMENT PROGRAM at alll,but as jsut another government program where BOTh the funding aAND the benefits can be CHANGED according to your political philosophy. That is how Obama and leftist Democrats (including the wealth redistributin peooiple of CNN) look at Social Security: an OPPORTUNITY to CHANGE it into the WEALTH REDISTRIBUTIN welare program it should ALWAYS have been. I, , on the other hand, look at Social Seucirty as a program that should be turned into a rEAL RETIREMENT PLAN, with REAL RETIREMENT ACCOUNTS for people contributing to the program. This wouuld have been EASY to do when FDR set up the grogram. The problem now is that Social Secuirty taxes are being used to PAY PRESENT BENEFITS. This makes it now HARD to BOTH pay resent benefits, and set up a rEAL RETIRMENT PLAN with present Social Secuirty "taxes" (conributins). But it will be DISASTER to DISCARD the ideaa of Social Seucirty as a retirement program AT ALL, and treat it as jsut another government wealth redistributin/welfare probram to "soak the rich" and "help the poor"..
Segue to New Mexico State University, circa 1967-1968: an "honors" Social Studies class in which Tlhe Maverick Conservative had this same argument with the professor. I told the class, an the professor the turth: Social Seucirty is a BAD retirement plan/insurance program and a BAD welfare progaram (bad wealth redistributin program, because of those elements that try to make it at least LOOK like a real, selffunding retirement program). The professor ended up defending the program as a WELFARE program. So I asked him: "Why not be HONEST, then, and SAY that it is a welfare program, and not continue this FRAUD that it is a eral retirement program? Professor's anser: "Gordon, I can't believe yu don't realize the elderly need thei rDIGNITY. We NEED to let them have this dignity by continuing to treat Social Security as a retirement program, where our retirement is funded by your CONTRIBUTINOS to the program. The way the program is set up may not be defensible as a real retirement program (as my brother says, peole would TO TO JAIL), but it is close enough to give the elderly dignity and keep peole from beng destitute in their old age."
Do you understand what is happening NOW? I hipe so. Obama, leftist Democrats, the leftist media (CNN and the rest), and other are saying this; To HELL with dignity. We don't CARE about DIGNITY. We dont CARE about ERSPOSIBLITY, where peole at elast have some seembalnce of "contribuiting" to their own retirement like anyone else. We WANT redistribution of weath. We WANT EVERYNOE to FEEL that they are DEPENDENT on the GOVERNMENT. Notice lthat my professor was saying that elederly, peole, at least in 1967, wanted to feel that they had EARNED and PAID FORF the Social Security benefits tghat they receive, and that they are not receiving CHARITY. People like Erin Burnett and Gloria Borger--well aLL of CNN--believe that peole KNEED to BELIVE that Social Seucirty is a GIFT FROM THE GOVERNMENT upon which all of us conserative hypocrites DEPEND--even if we PAID far more into the program than we will ever get out, and certainly paid for a TERRIBLE "retirement program" when we could have PURCHASED an INFINITELY better retirement plan/annuity with the same amont of money. This idea that Social Security benefits are merely a GOVERNMENT BENEFIT (at their mercy and "discretion") for all peole who receive Social Secuirty is a Big Lie. It exposes the other Big Lie: that Social Security was ever really a "retirement program", even though taht was how it was supposedly set up.
However, think how BAD it is that Obama, leftist Democrats and our leftist media no lnoger think that peole even NEED to believe that they are paying for their own retirement, or that money is not being taken from other peole to GIVE to them. Has our country realy come to this? Hve we FALLEN this far since FDR, when people like my MOTHER believed taht FDR wanted people to WORK for what they got, and to PAY for what they got? I don't think the COUNTRY is at this state yet, depite Romney's faiure to tell the "47%" that it is the Obama/leftist/media deire to KEEP them as DEPENDENTS that is COSTING them more than they can ebver afford. (No, by the way, Romney has not said, despite LIAR Gloria Borger and LIAR Erin Burnett, and the other LIARS of The Liar Network, that people receiving Social Security benefits are "dependents' of the government or "sponging off other ppeole--the kin d of contentin worse than my own contention that Obama has ENDORSED Romney as a person "outside Washington>).
Why can't the GOP make hay with thie idea that Social Secuirty hsould be a REAL retirement plan, whre poople acutally have ACCOUNTS of their own that CANOT BE TAKEN AWAY FROM THEM? Because the present "struture" of Social Secuirty bad as it is, represents a "sacrfed cow"? I have just explained to you how Obama, leftist Democrats and our lefitst media are willing to DISCARD the entire concept of Social Seuciryt as a self-funded retirement program whre people PAY FOR their own retirement benefits, in faovr of a t total WELATH REDISTRIBUTIN MODEL. That is a REAL DESTRUCTIN of the original concept of Social Security. But somehow the GOP cannot seemt to even slow doen the Obama/Democrat/media march toward Social Security as a massive wealth redistributin program, even though it is obvius to me that most peole don't wantt it to be that. That fraudulent "payroll tax cut" was that every thing: a CONVERSIN of part of Social Secuirty from a self-funded retirement program to wealth redistribution. The next article will go into this FAILURE of the GOP to even defend the NO BRAINER idea that Social Security should be a REAL RETIREMENT PROGRAM that the Federal Government cannot just take away from yu after you have paid for it. Hereman Cain tried to take this on, and got NO support. WHY? Is it because GOP politicians are almost ALL Big Goverfnment, "dpendency" kind of peole at heart, who are ereally like Obama, leftist Democrats and the lefitst medai; WANTGING peoe to believe the FEDERAL POLITICIANS are "giving them" even something that they have PAID FOR (like Social Seucirty)? My answer is obvius: GOP politicians ARE about as bad as Obama and our leftist medai. But I will go into it further in the nextg article (or in the next feew days, whenver I have the time to do what will be part II of tghis article).
In the meantime, I want you to THINK ABOUT IT. Just how BAD are GOP politicians that they can't even DEFEND the idea of a self--fudinn g Social Security program OR sell the diea that we need a rEAL retirement program where people have INDIVIDUCAL ACCOUNTS THAT CANNOOT BE TAAKEN AWAY FROM THEM? Sometimes, peole think I am too harsh on the GOP. Whenever I think about this, I KNOW that I am NOT HARSH ENOUGH. I wil explain it all further to you in part II.
P.S. No proofreading or spell checking (bad eyesight).
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