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Old 01-14-2005, 11:26 AM   #61
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Originally Posted by lookout123
tax me more to take care of people who didn't plan for their own futures?
People who can't take care of their present may or may not have planned for their future, and they may or may not have been successful, and it may or may not be their fault.
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Old 01-14-2005, 11:58 AM   #62
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and it may or may not have anything to do with me.
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Old 01-14-2005, 01:04 PM   #63
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Well, I'm not going to try to convice you that helping the elderly is a good thing for society as a whole, if that's what you're asking for. I guess that's just something you agree with or not. Just don't try to justify it by saying that anyone who needs it didn't plan for their future, so it's their own fault.
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Old 01-14-2005, 01:20 PM   #64
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You know, if the shit somehow hits the fan and you, though no fault of your own, lose most of your savings, you might appreciate it a bit more. Sure, lots of people fuck up but lots of people just have bad luck, you might be one of them, you should know as well as anyone that financial markets are capricious beasts and the economic stability of the recent decades is, in the scheme of things, an anomaly.
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Old 01-14-2005, 01:24 PM   #65
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Originally Posted by Happy Monkey
... And it will be willing when the AARP is all Baby Boomers.
Now there's another good reason to abandon America. The free-riding whiner generation is about to flower. On the other hand, Republicans need to remember that they no longer have the moral authority to make the fiscal responsibility argument.
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Old 01-14-2005, 01:24 PM   #66
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HM, this is not about taking something away from people who are counting on it. i am talking about telling new generations as they come up that A) your taxes are going to be lower B) save it, invest it, blow it, it's your choice and your future.

if people have 40+ working years of their lives with the idea that they have to save if they want to retire someday, then they have plenty of time to do it. there will be some people who are through no fault of their own may run into problems. there are ways to help them without an all encompassing national retirement system. what we have now is a system that says "we don't think you going to plan ahead so we'll make sure you have a check." that completely removes choices from those who do plan, and removes accountability from those who don't.
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Old 01-14-2005, 01:29 PM   #67
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Republicans need to remember that they no longer have the moral authority to make the fiscal responsibility argument.
absolutely right, the republican party has whored itself out and sold out those committed to fiscal responsibility just as much as the democratic party has sold out those who think they stand for the working people.

they both give great lip service but little else.
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Old 01-14-2005, 02:43 PM   #68
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Originally Posted by lookout123
HM, this is not about taking something away from people who are counting on it. i am talking about telling new generations as they come up that A) your taxes are going to be lower B) save it, invest it, blow it, it's your choice and your future.
We tried that, and felt the need to create Social Security to fix it. None of my arguments rely on any distinction between "taking something away from people who are counting on it" and phasing it out for future generations. Both result in people who, through no fault of their own, need money to live on. Pre-Social-Security, people worked 40+ years of their life, knowing they had to provide for their retirement, and it didn't always work out. If we take away Social Security, people will still work 40+ years of their life, knowing they have to provide for their retirement, and it still won't always work out. The fundamental justifications for Social Security have not disappeared.

In any case, what you're arguing for is the elimination of Social Security, which is something that Bush pretends not to be doing. He prefers to to bleed it to death through the mouths of stockbrokers.
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Old 01-14-2005, 03:23 PM   #69
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This thread ROCKS!
George Bush sucks cocks
he's evil, he's ugly,
makes me just want to hurl,
a hypocrite, an asshole,
He makes my toenails curl
If you voted for him, I think you're a fool,
The people who voted for Kerry are cool,
He sent us to war and killed innocent folks,
tonight while he's sleeping, I hope that he croaks.
Gay people can't be on their lover's health plan,
and all these abortions that he wants to ban,
will cause all the crackheads to reproduce more,
the poor and the underage, unemployed whores,
they'll all be the moms of our next generation,
The world hates us now and I see no cessation,
The french think we're stupid, the U.N lost it's "u"
And medical research can't cure what they want to,
so if you have cancer spreading through your tush,
they won't find a cure, and you can thank 'ol george Bush
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Old 01-14-2005, 03:28 PM   #70
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yes, you're right. i am talking about ending social security. i think society would do just fine with SS being phased out. i also know that will never happen as long as people understand they can vote for entitlements. SS wasn't originally viewed as a long term retirement plan for all of society. it was a depression era feel-good. when created, few were expected to live on it very long. since its creation, people have become accustomed to counting that as part of their retirement savings and have become dependent on it. programs to help those on hard times could be built and run more efficiently than a broad based everybody-in national retirement system. IMO.


Bush is talking about setting up individual retirement accounts funded with the money that is currently just going into the big pot which is completely outside of the individual's control.

if the individual has the ability to invest their retirement money into the buckets of money they choose they can build their own retirement plan. from what i understand this would look something like the TSP's that are currently out there. the only difference is that instead of one large pool of money invested in treasuries, there will be many different accounts invested in various options. as long as the individual can't pull the money out to buy a house or car or candy bar, i don't really have a problem with it. it wouldn't be as efficient (compared to no program at all) for those that do plan for themselves, but it would allow for greater opportunity for growth while providing the safety net that you think people need. The difference is that i think most people can make better choices for their money than the government can.

************very simple math follows, i know there are variables, but there is no need to get more specific.********************

A) an individual starts saving $100/month at age 25 and does that until they are 65 (40 years)

B) if their investment choice averages only:

- 4% avg they will have $118,590 at age 65
- 7% avg they will have $264,012 at age 65
- 9% avg they will have $471,643 at age 65
those are just hypothetical numbers. if we take it a step further and see what a 40 year period in the market looks like it gets more interesting. What i am going to enter here is not a balanced portfolio or an exceptional one. it is a relatively middle of the road, growth and income oriented mutual fund. i would not recommend this one fund for someone's retirement plan, it is only a reference point for this discussion.

if a person saved $100 per month into this fund for 40 years it would looked like this:

40 year period ending:
2004 - 12.5% avg return total saved = $1.138million
1994 - 11.99% avg = $987,695
1984 - 11.72% avg = $914,940
1974 - 10.31% avg = $614,879

Those are 40 year numbers. $100/month. i know that contributions would vary based on income level, but if X% of your income HAD to go into your retirement plan, just like it does now, it would work. keep in mind that the individual who doesn't make enough money to contribute $100/month isn't exactly accustomed to a lifestyle that would require $1,000,000 in the bank.

Let's take this a step further. If an individual today gets roughly $1300/month from SS, would they be winning or losing by this plan? i don't think i would see the elderly roaming the streets fighting stray cats for garbage scraps.

*******************
edit: to be fair, not everyone has the inclination to be in equities so.
if you had put $100/month into a run of the mill bond fund from 1974-2004 (only 30 years, not 40)
the average return would have been 9% and there would be $173,396 in the account. again, not a number to shrug off.

i also forgot to mention that all of those numbers take into account commissions and operating expenses, so a system run similarly would not only be self-sustaining, it would be profitable so that it can help fund programs for those who are less fortunate.
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Old 01-14-2005, 03:54 PM   #71
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and i almost forgot what thread this is, so... George Bush smells really bad and sticks his tongue out at old ladies.
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Old 01-14-2005, 05:28 PM   #72
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Quote:
Originally Posted by lookout123
when created, few were expected to live on it very long.
That's not really true. While the average lifespan wasn't much past 65, the average lifespan for people who reached 65 wasn't much lower than it is now.
Quote:
programs to help those on hard times could be built and run more efficiently than a broad based everybody-in national retirement system. IMO.
Perhaps, but at least with everybody in, there's no dispute over who qualifies.
Quote:
Bush is talking about setting up individual retirement accounts funded with the money that is currently just going into the big pot which is completely outside of the individual's control.
That money is therefore NOT going into the SS fund, and is not available to pay benefits for people who do not opt for the new system. Therefore, the money to make that up has to come from the general fund, exacerbating Bush's deficit much faster than the current system.

The current trend is away from pensions and towards 401k's. If Social Security is put into the stock market, most people will have all their eggs in that basket, and a downturn in the market at the time they plan to retire will be devastating. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. On the other hand, if the US defaults on its treasury bills, people would have been better off investing their retirement in canned goods.
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Old 01-14-2005, 06:00 PM   #73
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i'm talking about telling those that are just starting out to take care of themselves because the handouts are going to stop.
Are you also telling those people that they don't have to pay in?
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Old 01-14-2005, 11:07 PM   #74
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bruce, to a limited degree yes. i don't know what the numbers would really look like, but it seems reasonable that the amount paid in should be able to be decreased until it reaches zero as the amount paid out decreases based on normal attrition. no matter which path is followed, when it comes to SS, at least one generation is going to get hosed over on SS benefit vs. amount paid in. better sooner than later.

but like i said, no career minded politician would ever support such a plan.

HM, did you even look at the numbers i entered? if an individual only paid $100/month into the new SS system they would have very substantial amounts of money to fund their retirements not even counting the 401K that most people also fund to some extent. If they retired in 2004 with @$1,000,000 and the next year experienced a 40% drop in the value of their individual account, they would still possess $600,000. If it dropped another 20% the next year they would still have $480,000. How many months of $1300 (what the average SS payment i see looks like) payments would $480,000 be good for?

at no time in the history of this country has a 40 investment in treasuries outperformed the market. past performance is not indicative of future results is the mantra of my business, but with all due respect, if we ever see a time period where the markets behaved like that, the world has a lot bigger problems than what Mrs Olsen down the street has in her retirement account.
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Old 01-15-2005, 10:54 AM   #75
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Originally Posted by lookout123
at no time in the history of this country has a 40 investment in treasuries outperformed the market.
Not all funds perform as well as the market, and not everybody gets the average. For example, just over a quarter of the funds available in my 401k lost money this year (including 3 of the four that I have money in). Now, if I got discouraged with my choices and moved my money into other funds, the ones I moved into could easily do the same next year. If the average return is, say, 12%, there is a bell curve of people's actual returns centered on that.

Most of the funds available on my 401k are less than 10 years old, never mind 40, so most peoples money will have to be transferred between funds as poor funds are terminated, which means that those people will be selling at a point that the fund has been losing money, and probably buying a fund that is currently doing well. Most people will not have the advice of stockbrokers, and will be pretty much flying blind.
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