Social Security - why isn't * changing things for 55+ yr olds?

[Deja Q]

I'm happy for most of them as they'll get SOMETHING.

But most won't.

Indeed, if he's scrapping social security (which alone didn't do enough 30 years ago and sure as hell isn't sufficient now), can I just have the money back? I know I won't live to be 55, so why can't I spend it now?

[coloradodem2005]

1. How do you know you won't live to be 55?

[Deja Q]

2. Many things:

1. Immediate Health
2. PEAK OIL
3. Too many LBN threads are showing the world is sowing seeds to retaliate if the US goes too far; a happenstance I see happening at some point. 'untamed fire of freedom' = nuclear war.
4. Economy might just crash in the next few months anyway so I may as well live it up with every penny I can get NOW.

[hfojvt]

5. the point is not whether he will live to be 55

It is whether he is 55 now. See my letter to the editor in the Kansas forum, probably on page 2.
The 55 thing is a political ploy to win the hearts and minds of AARP. To some extent it is being fair as well, since those 55 and older have paid into the current system a) with certain benefits being promised to them and b) they do not have enough time to build up a private account.
I find it ironic that my nemesis, the AARP, is on my side in the matter of private accounts. Usually they love to screw the young working class in favor of the old non-working class.

[cornermouse]

3. Haven't you been listening to the talking heads?

Bush isn't going to scrap social security. He's going to fix it. And anyone who says otherwise is nothing but a scaremonger. So there!

[meow2u3]

4. It's an awful, evil, dirty LIE!!

Bush is just saying that because he thinks seniors are dumb and will fall for anything.
Mark my word, he will cut benefits when he says he won't!

[hfojvt]

6. sure, he is going to cut benefits

for those 54 and younger. A group which includes yours truly.

[Wickerman]

7. After Bush's death he will be deified, much like St Ronald

He will live at least 10 or 15 more years, like it or not. They will have time to try to rehab his image right about the time people are realizing how screwed they got under him.

I'd like to think he would be remembered as slightly worse than Hitler, but with media and marketing behind him and absent a criminal conviction they will paint him as a saint on par with Ronnie. The democrats will get all the blame after we pull the fat out of the fire and fix things AGAIN. It happened with Clinton, it'll happen again, with help from the librul media.

[seventythree]

8. Because he thought if he didn't include 55+ in his new

machinations, he'd divide and conquer. The sky IS not falling on SS. It is rock solid until 2042 (of course the general fund will take a hit for the 1.7 trillion it owes SS, increasing at 150 billion a year at present)and even then, it can pay out 73%. So you tweak here, and there (get new state and local workers paying in as federal workers started doing in 1984, raise retirement for the newbies from 67 to 68/69, push off the early retirement to 63, not that many can do it before 65 (boomers have to wait until 66 for full benefits) anyway since there are few companies which offer retirement health care, continue to index the cap on payments) and in the end, maybe have to raise SS taxes on the next generation to cover their needs, just as it was done on the boomers to cover their's in 1983 or so.

[bookman]

9. But he IS cutting benefits for 55+...

...the formula for cost of living adjustments will be changed. The lying bastards fail to mention this.