Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Health care / Social Security / Medicare & politics -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: steve kammerer who wrote (15)	12/11/1998 5:28:00 PM
From: mrknowitall	Respond to of 25

Steve - good points - if we break the problem down to its fundamentals, our present situation is that we didn't hold the money in individual accounts for individuals. The socialistic approach told us that there would always be a source of funds to fill in the distribution and thus, benefits were mandated for political purposes knowing full well that the eventual objective would have to be more and more confiscation from those who had the means. Since we are powerless to change the political OPM (Other People's Money) addict's behavior in buying votes with SS checks, we are forced to experiment with the revenue side first, before the "we're here to save you" democrats have the luxury of demonizing the evil republicans for trying to rape and pillage the elderly. Personally, I don't expect to get my SS funds - I've written them out of my retirement planning as I believe anyone who manages their own investments should. It's a nice dose of reality. We have to face the facts - there is only so much wealth to go around, and those who have it are going to have it taken from them and distributed to those who do not. Our personal answer is make more. The government sort-of wants us to do that so we will have more for them to take when they want it, but socialism demands a penalty for accumulation of wealth. I still believe we have no choice but to adopt a higher-rate-of-return strategy for the trust fund itself - those paper treasury obligations are essentially worthless in terms of ROI. The full-faith and credit of the US government is a shambles, given our debt situation, so SS needs a better set of investments. You're exactly right that one of the things unnaturally propping up stock PE's is the influx of investment $ from retirement-like programs. That's a two-edged sword; it's good now for the 401K participants but we have to be honest with ourselves - it sets them up for a SS-less future when means testing recognizes the payouts as income and diminishes the SS payments. Until we develop a more self-reliant, self-actualized and economically educated electorate, we're going to be in the situation of the better-off being raided to succor those who rely on the government. Mr. K.