General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSo Geithner said that Social Security trust fund will run out by 2033.
Plug 2033 and Social Security into Google and you see articles from almost every news source possible listed over the course of the past 24 hours. Apparently it is attributable partially to the fact that we boomers aren't dying fast enough as well as cost of energy and slow economic recovery.
What is the political purpose of putting this out there now, given that realistically there is absolutely nothing constructive this congress will do about anything before the election is over?
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)Thanks for the thread, Skidmore.
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)with nearly an edge of panic to the report. It struck me as even more peculiar that Geithner put this out there. Something is going on somewhere. Who is trying to sell what to the nation now?
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)and they have an inherent financial conflict of interest.
The Social Security Administration rarely if ever buys commercials from them, but you can bet the last dollar in your wallet, Stock-brokerage Firms, Insurance Corporations, Banks and various other sellers of financial products do and would love to buy even more advertising with the vast quantity of social security dollars collected from the American People.
If Geitner said Social Security would run out of money by 2033 he's either lying or so sadly mistaken as to make it tragic that he has such a powerful position in government, however if Geitner said Social Security would be "insolvent" aka; paying out more than collecting in 2033 and it's being reported by the corporate media as "run out of money" by 2033, then their obvious conflct of interest is driving them.
dkf
(37,305 posts)Projections are that payouts will be approximately 75% of what was promised.
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)to make up for the loss of the excess; which of course the nation has been spending for other purposes, that's not the same as "run out of money."
joeglow3
(6,228 posts)Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)is maintained re: the time element and full disclosure of all extenuating circumstances are in the mix of the reporting.
girl gone mad
(20,634 posts)Reporting on it is fine, but breathless hyperbole is not.
dkf
(37,305 posts)If we've turned ourselves into Greece then fat chance.
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)Greece will look good to us.
girl gone mad
(20,634 posts)The size of our deficit is not a determinative data point.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)Unless our economy gets even worse and stays that way for good, SS is fully funded as far out as has been studied (75 years).
Both parties want to grab the trillions in the SS Trust Fund so they can hyperlow-low taxes for the wealthiest Americans. They'll try again after the elections.
Shame.
Snake Alchemist
(3,318 posts)MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)was shortly before his inauguration.
Of course his more immediate demands became clearer later, e.g.:
Rep. Conyers: Obama Demanded Social Security Cuts--Not GOP
I'm so glad Obama spent his whole first term setting up new programs instead of trying to save existing ones from bankruptcy. I thought Dems were suppose to look out for SS, Medicare, etc. no?
dkf
(37,305 posts)It's your numbers that are off because the lifeblood of the economy, cheap oil, is a thing of the past.
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)a thing of the past as we convert to more efficient and sustainable alternatives.
dkf
(37,305 posts)Then the misery of transitioning will be so much more difficult. I predict it will take even more out of GDP than they are projecting.
Uncle Joe
(58,426 posts)people, green friendly urbanization, or the growing role of the Internet in either curtailing the use of unnecessary fossil fuel burning, or simply mass brainstorming synergy toward more efficient use of systems, creations and developments.
dkf
(37,305 posts)magical thyme
(14,881 posts)talking about alternative energy. Impression I got is that we have many alternatives that can do it if we have the political will.
Enough geothermal -- and the new technology to use it -- to last us a few hundred thousand years or so. I couldn't catch all of it -- the storm was fritzing it out...
dkf
(37,305 posts)Every time I see Democrats insist oil is expensive because of speculation I cringe. That gives the populace the impression that it's all right except for the greedy SOBs which is no way to convince anyone of the need to move to alternatives.
rfranklin
(13,200 posts)Every single stock option and dividend included.
rsmith6621
(6,942 posts)100% funded till 2036
75% from 2036
not going broke...
................WE NEED TO SCRAP THE CAP............MAKE
SoCalDem
(103,856 posts)because they cannot afford it anymore, many boomers will not live as long as perhaps their own parents did.''Our environment and our "gadgets" are more dangerous all the time, so cancers will continue to decimate people at earlier and earlier ages.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)The money has to come from somewhere.
Aren't the top politicians doing what Reagan did? That is borrow money from the Social Security trust fund with no intention of paying it back.
TheWraith
(24,331 posts)This myth that somehow money is being taken out of the Social Security Trust Fund is just that, a myth with no truth behind it.
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)Maybe you are better informed than them and Al Gore who opposed further borrowing from the SS trust fund.
joeglow3
(6,228 posts)denverbill
(11,489 posts)/sarcasm.
TheKentuckian
(25,029 posts)And it will take damn near divine intervention to ever restore FICA taxes.
sad sally
(2,627 posts)Imagine how happy this must make chimpy who really really wanted a totally privatized retirement system.
damn old people, why don't they (me and the love of my life) just die sooner? Maybe this will be the divine intervention?
marlakay
(11,498 posts)they said oil would be gone by 2000 and they did this big scare thing Johnson was pres not sure why the big scare maybe republicans during election year after all Nixon was next!
Scuba
(53,475 posts)Lawlbringer
(550 posts)continues to grow? Even if we were at 15% unemployment, the population growth factor would sort of level that out with prior years. So wouldn't everyone working keep paying into it?
The only problem I could see is if younger people start receiving benefits.
JHB
(37,162 posts)They've been doing SS projections for a while. How soundly have their projections held up once the reality becomes known?
For instance, from Doug Henwood in 1994:
The eventual bankruptcy of the U.S. Social Security system is taken for granted by nearly everyone, virtually without challenge. In part, that's understandable; who really wants to delve into the annual reports of the system's trustees?
But the reports repay study. Of some interest is the news, for example, that the higher the rate of immigration, the sounder the system is, since immigrants (legal or not) tend to be young, and swell the ranks of those paying into the system rather than drawing it down.
Immigration, however, won't make or break the Social Security's finances. GDP growth will, since the size of the economy decades hence will determine how much money is available to pay retirees. The bankruptcy scenario is based on an assumption that GDP will grow at a rate seen only in depression decades.
As is common in the work of official seers, the trustees present three sets of forecasts, an official guess, an optimistic one, and a pessimistic one. The official scenario assumes the economy will grow an average of 1.5% a year over the next 75 years half the rate seen in the last 75 (2.9%), and a rate matched only in one decade of the last century, 1910-20's 1.4% rate. The economy grew more quickly even during the 1930s, 1.9% (1930-40). The growth rate for the trustees' optimistic vision, 2.2%, is only slightly bouncier than the 1930s rate. The pessimistic guess is 0.7%, slower than population growth, and a rate so torpid as to guarantee a war of each against all. As the graph shows, the system will go bust only if you assume decades of stagnation. If the economy grows in line with the 197394 average of 2.4%, still slower than the 75-year average of 2.9%, it will run a big surplus.
Either the trustees are deliberately projecting slow growth to feed the pension-cutting mania, or they're expressing a deep pessimism about the U.S. economy's future. Big news, whichever it is.
http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Pensions.html
Is there any place where past Trustee reports are fact-checked?
Ulcer
(5 posts)Does Obama think we aren't smart enough to see that his payroll tax cut at the expense of SS is just an attempt to buy our votes? If my vote were for sale, it would cost way more than $40/month. I can't believe a Democrat would raid SS for this purpose.
cyberswede
(26,117 posts)Ulcer
(5 posts)I suppose the machines will decide for us anyway. But, it's still a thought. I guess Dennis is available now.
Skidmore
(37,364 posts)your comments.
Ulcer
(5 posts)[link:http://tv.yahoo.com/news/jon-lovitz-blasts-president-obamas-tax-rich-plan-021221948.html|
http://tv.yahoo.com/news/jon-lovitz-blasts-president-obamas-tax-rich-plan-021221948.html
Someone must've gotten to him! I can't imagine he really wants the government to keep going broke.
Zorra
(27,670 posts)Geithner is a 1% Bankster.
What is constructive for the 99% is not his concern.
n2doc
(47,953 posts)So that those funds can be redirected into war and ag/oil subsidies. Plus more tax cuts for the rich.
Snake Alchemist
(3,318 posts)WI_DEM
(33,497 posts)Cleita
(75,480 posts)And, they are making it look like it's also coming from the left from credible sources. Of course, we know left today was right yesterday, so I am inclined to believe it's all a scam that can be traced back to Wall Street's desire to co-opt the last part of the US Treasury they haven't been able to touch.
spanone
(135,886 posts)unfuckingbelievable...they didn't credit geithner, the said 'the government claimed'
fear is more potent than facts
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