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

To: koan who wrote (784887)	5/15/2014 2:25:32 AM
From: i-node	2 Recommendations Recommended By FJB TideGlider Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1573690

>> Social security has saved millions and millions of people from suffering. I don't disagree with that statement. Never suggested otherwise. Only that it is morally wrong to do that on the backs of future generations. >> And the social security is not in trouble. It is solvent. It is the government that owes money to SS. You don't know what you're talking about. SS is approximately 10 trillion in debt beyond what it has available. That is present value, meaning we'd have to deposit it now for the trust to grow to what is required. Solvency is not the criterion for a long-term benefit plan. This problem is precisely the same as the problem with Medicare and public pension trusts (state and federal). It is what happens when you use bogus accounting, as state and federal governments have from the outset. You cannot just "pay as you go", which is what we're doing and why our kids are in trouble. >> SS is solvent and if they just take off the cap it will be good for 75 years. Assuming, arguendo, this were correct, then what? 75 years isn't even one person's average lifetime. These trusts should (must, actually) be funded for perpetuity, or they're precisely what I said: Dumping huge liabilities on future generations. Sure, we can raise taxes -- raise taxes for SS, raise taxes for Medicare, raise taxes to fund public pensions -- THEN we can start working on the national debt. The cold, hard reality is you cannot raise taxes that much and still have people work. You would have to have close to $300,000 per man, woman and child in this country, TODAY, to handle this debt burden. Keeping in mind there are only 75 million tax returns filed annually, and half of those are not paying tax, it just isn't remotely conceivable these obligations can be met. You're an idiot. Doug Elmendorf testified before Congress a few months ago and stated it as clearly as it can be: The deficits are "unsustainable", and he listed four reasons, (1) SS, (2) Medicare, (3) Obamacare subsidies, and (4) Interest on the debt. Nothing else matters. You know less than nothing about this subject. You're "knowledge" is counterproductive, like that other idiot, Bernie Sanders. You're fools, village idiots, who don't give a flying fuck about future generations or you would educate yourselves.