Privatizing Social Security

Why. We don't want to rely on the government for our retirement, so that means we love big brother? You didn't even vote.

 

At this point I don't know enough about it to form a concrete opinion. I'm in a poli/sci class which one of the projects is to break the whole thing down and do a serious analysis of it though. We'll be applying statistical methods etc.... anyone got any good ideas towards info sources (please, just data not spins)?

 

Personally I think "independent" or "fact only" sources are mythical beasts - I don't bother trying to find them, instead I read from both sides of the debate and then compare.


Nonetheless, this website comes close to neutral. It is on the whole somewhat biased towards privatization, but it certainly contains a wealth of information which is just facts.

http://www.justfacts.com/socialsecurity.htm

I can tell you one thing though - both pro and anti privatization camps obsess about trust fund solvency. The first thing you have to realise is that trust fund solvency is a meaningless concept. You have to push that issue aside to get to the real issues.

 

It's too bad that we can't privatize Bush.

 

we should end social security, and concentrate on social medicine, which would reign in insurance and pharmacutical companies, and free up places of employment and employess from paying for insurance.that and the lack of social security tax, would be more than enough money to have medical coverage for everone, and it would greatly lower presciption prices.

 

I dont see how we can get rid of social security all together. What would then happen to the people who can never work because of disabilities. These people also count on the social security system to suvive. We have mentally disabled people out there in wheel chairs who cant speek or do hardly anything as well as people with other certain problems that need money from the social security system to survive. There would have to be another system for these people then.

 

how bout killing the ritch and burning all the money and smashing all the fences boarders and prisons

 

Well you do know untill basically about 1940 these people relied on private charties, this hasn't been a program that's just always magicaly been there.

 

True enough, I just dont know how well it would work today. These people need a certain amount of gaurantied income today. I get social security and SSI. I also have certain bills that have to be paid every month. I have to have a certain amount each month to do that. The price of things now days is so far out of control it isn't funny. Now if they could setup a system that guarenties a certain amount each month, I wouldn't mind it. Just so i know what i am going to get each month. Just so i have enough to survive, Im not greedy.

One problem i do see with privatization right now that would have to be changed if it's true, my dad retires in about five years. The way i understand it, if they change it he will not have anything he paid in in the past. He does not have enough money to make a decent investment in social security, so when he retires he would have basically nothing. If they keep the system the way it is he would be getting 1000.00 a month because of all the years he put in. If they change it he looses all those years. With this system the poor will be even poorer and the rich richer.

Here is another possible problem, the way i understand it you would invest you money in social security. If it's investing in the stock market, NO THANKYOU! what if the market goes belly up. What if we get other terrorist attacks. What will happen with your money. Will you loose it? I dont belive in gambling with social security.

Those assholes in the white house should have never spent the social security that was paid in over the years. If they would have kept there damn hands off it we wouldn't have a problem.

 

Hmmmm....should I get medicine, or should I get money for food and pay the bills. Another Bush Quagmire.

Where does the money go?

http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

 

That's a common misconception, but privatization wouldn't mean breaking the promises to people who have paid into the system their whole life. The biggest reason that Congress is up in arms over the privatization of social security is because it would be expensive in the short-term to do so...because privatization would mean continuing to pay out social security to those who have paid into it, but collecting NO revenue for the future. This is doable, but congressional Democrats are correct when they say it will be expensive (in the short term).

I've heard that total privatization would cost somewhere between $500 billion and $1.2 trillion...quite a large chunk of change. However, the cost of inaction will be even larger in the long term. There are a couple solutions regarding how to pay for this: George W. Bush simply wants to drive up the deficit even higher, which is reckless and, frankly, stupid. The Libertarian Party has a much better idea in my opinion. The United States owns enormous tracts of unused land for military bases around the world. The value of that land is between $10 and 30 trillion. If it was sold off, we could easily privatize social security as well as completely paying off the national debt.

 

the only thing we have to fear, is fear itself. i know disabled people on social security. i myself may be mentally disabled, but will never see a dime. people lose everythhing while waiting for the SSI beaurocracy to finish up. then they are given not enough tosurvive, but live in fear of making money and losing the SSI. it is a bad system. it continues to get worse. there is no scenario where it will get better. it is best to end it soon if it will definately get worse and not get better, rather than let it drain society further. it is corrupt. the truth is is that the govt. already spent the money in it on non social security programs. it must end. its a sinking ship. all of FDR's programs were intentionally aimed at enslaving us. SSI is a horrible thing. i really think the only solution is for my generation to pay for it and opt to never recieve it, so that the next generations are not burdened with it.

 

That is exactly what I'm worried about.

 

If you privatize it (allowing for competition, rather than a government monopoly) it is possible that a few of the social security corporations would go bust...but the vast majority would not. If you still want some form of government security, the government could offer insurance to the SS companies much like the FDIC does for banks.

If you leave the system alone, it becomes more and more likely that the American government as a whole will go the way of Enron.

 

The federal government guaranteeing things is often what causes the problems. If there's no fear of failure, people get careless with the money or abuse it. Has everyone forgotten the savings and loan scandal?

Privatizing doesn't have to be the main attempt at solving the problem, although Bush appears to have put it on the top of his agenda. If the federal govt could control its outrageous spending (on non-SS matters), problems with SS would be alleviated.

The fed govt could guarantee a small portion of the money, but not nearly all of it. It can't guarantee all the money in the banks either if we had another event like the great depression. Any way you look at it, there's risk to investment. There is no fool-proof, risk-free, higher yield, guaranteed, (and I doubt tax-exempt) solution, although Bush made it sound as though this is the case in his SOTU speech.

 

There is a difference between guaranteeing the investments and guaranteeing that they won't be stolen. Nobody would guarantee that your private account wouldn't go down, they would just guarantee that the fund manager won't wire the whole account to Panama or extend it as a loan to the company. I think that is manageable and probably essential, in fact that's what the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation does now. Although the PBGC has some problems, they relate to defined benefit plans, not defined contribution plans. Privatised SS accounts would be defined contribution plans.

 

I live on a combination of social security and ssi, i get 599 a month and have more than enough to live on. I get medicade and medicare with that to. I hope they never get rid of the medical coverage either. It cost about 200 dollars a month for my medicine. I am not able to work. I have never had a problem with the system as far as getting my benifits although i know the system is corrupt. the thing is that stuff cost so much money today to. What if i ever need major surgery, who would pay for that. Where would the people who can not work be if this system was done away with, in the street starving to death? Something has to be there for these people who truely need it or they will be in the streets. Some say local charities, they would never get enough money out of local charities to cover everything. A guarentied system has to be there. I agree that it needs overhauling and it is corrupt, but you have to have something there to help these people.

I know the government really already spent th social security on other things, thats why i said earlier if they would have kept there hands off it we wouldn't be in this mess.

Some people have to recieve ssi to survive, belive it or not there are people out there who can't work to get the money they need to survive. they have no other alternative but to get help from the system somehow.

Dont get me wrong, i do agree that the system is corrupt and something needs to be done, I dont like to see the hard working tax payers get taken. At the same time something has to be there for the people who cant work.

 

I think American's deserve a guarenteed system. We are the richest country in the world, there is no good excuse for not affording these benefits to our citizens.

 

Hi Sera Michele
Yes i agree totally for the people who really need it, a guarentied system has to be there. As far as the people who can work but are sitting home doing nothing, i say we need to create more jobs out there so these people can go back to work and for the ones just being lazy create more jobs and make them go back to work. But yes for those out there who trueley cant handle work, the sytem needs to be there for them. No doubt though it does need overhauling.

 

There is continuing (deliberately encouraged, by some) confusion about the difference between a partial privatization of social security and the elimination of social security. Nobody has proposed eliminating social security, and there will still be guaranteed social security income for everybody under the (vague) Bush plan. Futhermore, the disability portion of social security is a different part of the system than what is being privatized.

Regardless of whether we are rich or poor, the point is to have the most efficient system for providing retirement income. Privatizing would be more efficient. No country is rich enough to do something as expensive as social security in a less than optimal way.