Yeah and outright making up things is the sign of a failed argument. The Tea Party does not have an official position on anything besides run away government spending, so quit trying to cast them as some regular multi plank political party.

Over 2/3 of total federal spending is on social programs already.

46% of healthcare in the US was already delivered with the US government as the payee, and to a large degree this continues to be the problem since medicare and medicaid both reimburse BELOW COST in many cases. As a result, private insurance MUST increase to cover the negative income.

Adding new entitlements when we cannot afford the ones already on the books is insanity.

My "tea-party" like solution would be to freeze spending at a few % above 2007 for 5-10 years. In addition, I'd phase the retirement age older. Say in 3 years it goes from 65 to 66, in 5 years from 66 to 67, in 7 from 67 to 68 and so forth until it reaches whatever 65 was in terms of life expectancy when SS was first passed or the average lifespan, whichever is lower.

Retirement is not a right, the whole point for pushing retirement was in fact to screw skilled workers in favor of the young.

65 YO workers are at top pay scales, so dump them out of the workplace and hire 2 young guys for the same money—and the 65YO doesn't get counted as "unemployed" which makes the numbers look better. SS should be what it was supposed to be, a safety net. Medicare should also go up the same way.

Medicaid should be a write-off for providers.

The only problem with that idea is back when SS was first passed it was given to people who had never contributed to it. I've been paying SS taxes forever. Money I'd much rather have kept and invested myself.

Now I wouldn't be very happy if my government tried such a Yossarian trick on me.

Stone age? Ahem, I don't think our nation started in the stone age. not one bit.

Maybe not but I certainly have the right to every dime I was forced to put towards it over the past 40 years, plus interest. So pay up.

How old are you? Would upping the "retirement" age to 72 change anything with your financial planning other than giving you more years to pile up money since as it stands, if you're young, SS will go belly up anyway, and you'll get nothing at all.

That's what we're talking about, getting SOMETHING at a later retirement age, or having the country go belly up. 2/3+ spending on entitlements, and pop grown not replacing the people here now. The ponzi scheme is going to fail.

So you are near retirement, then. As I said, pass the bill next year, and 4 years from now the retirement age ups to 66. If you retire in 4 years, you see no change at all. 4+and you work ONE year more. If you retire in 6 years, then you work 2 extra years, and so forth. The specifics can change if that is too close. 3 years then up to 66, then 3 more for 67, or whatever. Or delay 5 years before even starting. That's minutiae.

I'm not that near to retirement Tater. I'm 50, and i've been working and paying into Social Security since 1970. That's 40 years of payments with at least another 15 years to go before I can collect on that very considerable investment.

If you want to end this government retirement Ponzi scheme then I completely support that, but i'll be expecting back every dime i've been forced to contribute into it, as well as 40 years worth of interest.

You'd still get the same benefits you expect, just maybe a few years later.

Again, the choice is that, or nothing, IMO. Or we could have hyper inflation, and SS can pay you your X grand a month but it will be worth $100.

http://www.urban.org/PublicationImag...36_figure2.gif

As you can see, it's a ponzi scheme that requires the worker population to increase because everyone gets more out than they put in (the "rich" only because of medicare).

Total lifetime payments is hard to ballpark since there are no calculators set up for it. You can't just do 15.3% times incomes, since the cap in earlier years was VERY low (~10k) and is now over 100 grand. At some middle income someone would likely paid in 150 grand perhaps?

I'm all for allowing people going forward to not pay in, but I think the retirement age needs to increase since the worker population is actually shrinking.

Yeah that's what they kept telling Yossarian. I want my money and I want it when it was promised. I won't compromise and I won't let anyone off the hook.

Then you and everyone else will get squat.

I assume (I'm 45 YO) that I'll see nothing from SS and plan with that as the base point. I don't care if I don't get it til 70. You shouldn't, either, frankly. It's the "I'm getting X at 65, period!" attitude that makes it the "third rail." That drives the government doing NOTHING to fix it, not ever. Interest? SS was never invested. It was simply spent. There is no "lock box," it's revenue, plain and simple. Asking for more than you paid in? I pay way more in taxes than I'd ever see in government benefits. I'd dearly love to get back in services what I pay in, conservatively we must pay in a large multiple of what we get.

Since they'll listen to people like you, the only solution is to become insolvent. BTW, any expectation of payment is BS, IMHO. You will get medicare drug benefit (Bush), and the bulk of your working life you will have paid in NOT expecting that at all. How about people only get the medicare drug beni if they paid in for their entire working life with that on the table? You'll have 15 years paying in with that expectation, and 40 years without.

If the US loses our credit rating, you'll not get the same benis, either. 2/3 of the budget is entitlements. The only way to reduce the deficit is to curtail entitlements, period.

Says who, you?

And just what motivation does being willing to accept delayed/reduced benefits provide? Answer absolutely none. All sayng "I assume (I'm 45 YO) that I'll see nothing from SS" does is tell the government that they can get away with stealing every dime you put into it because they know you'll accept your fate having prepared yourself for it for decades.

Then curtail entitlements to those who didn't pay for them first.

Look tater SS is nothing compared to the rest of the Federal budget. Believe me when I say they'll be able to afford it when the time comes. Just because they might get to a point where they are paying out more than they are taking in doesn't mean they suddenly won't be able to afford paying any of it. That's where you entire "accept less or get nothing" argument falls apart.

Wrong. "Programatic" spending—entitlements—like SS, medicare, and medicaid are currently TWO THIRDS of the total federal budget.

The rest of the budget is in fact nothing compared to SS. You have it backwards. The entire discretionary budget (you know, stuff like all military spending) is only 1/3 of spending. Medicaid is in fact small, the lion's share is "retirement" crap—SSI and Medicare.

Solving the budget problems requires SSI/Medicare cuts, period.

But I wasn't talking about medicare, medicaid or any other "programmatic" spending, just SS. Nor do you address the fact that any revenue shortfalls will be at first be small and easily covered. Nor did you address the millions of new taxpayers paying their share as the population grows.

But whatever, it looks like neither of us are gonna change the others mind so you tell your reps to vote your way and i'll tell mine to vote the way I want and we'll see who gets what.

SS and medicare together are about 50% of spending. SS is more than defense alone.

For 2007:
SS: 581.4
Medicare: 436
Medicaid: 196
Income security (ERISA): 202
other retirement: 158.7

Defense: 547.9

(all in billions)

I have no care about people getting out more than they paid in. None of it was invested, the expectation of ANY return is asking for something for nothing. It's a Ponzi Scheme.

I don't want the cap raised to pay for your retirement, because I don't want to put more in when I'll get nothing meaningful back. For SS, we'll get back less than what we'll pay already. Not some small interest, less. And what we'll get for a year is trivial.

Anyone getting more than what they paid in is NOT getting something they earned, they are taking from someone else as long as the pay outs exceed revenues with no investment (and so far there has not been SS investment).

What you are asking for is a handout, plain and simple.