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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Tenchusatsu who wrote (215129)1/16/2005 1:57:59 PM
From: neolib  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 1573898
 
Ok, I understand in what sense you mean myth now. My apologies.

But then, why don't you advocate (and vote) for fixing the accounting scams?

SS is not broken in any sense. Accounting for the SS funds is broken.

The only plausible argument that a thinking person can make for "fixing" SS is that the current method of accounting is such an addictive drug that no politician can muster the courage to correct the accounting scams.

But surely the energy expended by Bush to privatize the system could be used instead to insulate SS funds from the general fund. Do you really think Bush can do one, but not the other??

I think the true motivation of those (including Bush and most conservatives) for pushing SS "reform" is that they do not like the progress nature of SS taxation. They don't like the fact that there is a nonlinear relationship between an individuals funds payed in and the return received. Well, fine, then argue that battle separately.

Neither Bush, nor any other politician is going to get up and argue that cause however. They will state it in terms of returning control to the taxpayer, etc (typical libertarian claptrap) but they will NOT say that poorer people should get less SS than the current system provides them while wealthier individuals should get more than they do under the current system.

Mindmeld at least tentatively admitted that. If one is going to restrict risk (as one should for SS payouts) and invest in T-bills, then having a single entity like the government do it is not sufficiently different from the private sector doing it to justify changing the system. The only significant difference is that the payout formula will be different (your funds are tracked and earmarked just for you). Surprise, the existing system has a method of calculating your returns as well. Change that formula if you think it needs changing and one can muster the voter approval, but don't make foolish arguments that avoid the central issue.