I read this article this weekend, and i was surprised by how much sense it makes. I wonder why neither party will discuss this? Heres the real reason bush needs to put 5 trillion into the stock market.
micheal hudsons article

 

To much reading for me. I've already made my stock market investments over the last 20 years and they are doing very well. The 401k plan I have been in for the last 15 years is also doing very well. SS would be nice but I'm not going to depend on it for my retirement years. Best bet is to make your own investments and not rely on the gov.

 

Got this in an email from a relative.[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]



IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU ARE REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT!
KEEP IT GOING!!!!

2008 Election Issue!!

GET A BILL STARTED TO PLACE ALL POLITICIANS ON SOC. SEC.
This must be an issue in "2008 ". Please! Keep it going.

----------------------------------
SOCIAL SECURITY:
(This is worth reading. It is short and to the point.)

Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions during election years.
Our Senators and Congresswomen do not pay into Social Security and, of course, they do not collect from it.
You see, Social Security benefits were not suitable for persons of their rare elevation in society. They felt they should have a special plan for themselves. So, many years ago they voted in their own benefit plan .
In more recent years, no congressperson has felt the need to change it. After all, it is a great plan.
For all practical purposes their plan works like this:
When they retire, they continue to draw the same pay until they die.
Except it may increase from time to time for cost of living adjustments..
This is calculated on an average life span for each of those two Dignitaries. For example, Senator Byrd and Congressman White and their wives may expect to draw $7,800,000.00 (that's Seven Million, Eight-Hundred Thousand Dollars), with their wives drawing $275,000.00 during the last years of their lives.
Younger Dignitaries who retire at an early age, will receive much more during the rest of their lives.
Their cost for this excellent plan is $0.00. NADA....ZILCH....
This little perk they voted for themselves is free to them. You and I pick up the tab for this plan. The funds for this fine retirement plan come directly from the General Funds;
"OUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK"!
>From our own Social Security Plan, which you and I pay (or have paid) into,-every payday until we retire (which amount is matched by our employer)-we can expect to get an average of $1,000 per month after retirement.
Or, in other words, we would have to collect our average of $1,000 monthly benefits for 68 years and one (1) month to equal Senator! Bill Bradley's benefit!
Social Security could be very good if only one small change were made.

That change would be to:
Jerk the Golden Fleece Retirement Plan from under the Senators and Congressmen. Put them into the Social Security plan with the rest of us
then sit back.....
and watch how fast they would fix it.
If enough people receive this, maybe a seed of awareness will be planted and maybe good changes will evolve.

 

The T bills that your economist is referring to in the long article are merely promises by politicians of what future politicians are going to extort from the taxpaying public. There is no Social Security trust fund, it's in deficit each month as it's all part of the general fund (which is $400 BILLION in the red just for this year).

I'd rather have some of my 12% SS money invested in real things not a vote grubber's promise.

Which is why my retirement preparations exclude social security, which will implode and become a food stamp program to keep old people from starving to death, which was it's original intent.

 

Both good points, but theres more to it than that. Itll take 20 minutes max to read and understand it, my 6th grade daughter read and understood it.
Its important that the reasons, behind the "change ", which arent talked about, are understood by the voters. It was written by a well respected economist professor, who knows what hes talking about. This isnt wacko stuff, and because the dems and reps wont even touch on this aspect...i gotts believe its true.

 

All I guess we need to know is the end result:

You and me get screwed.

The politicians get cushy retirement.

Period.

In other words, cover yer own butt cause that's the only way it gets covered.

 

Isnt it a scam, to use the last untouched pool of money left in america, to prop up the stock market....because the ponzi skeem is failing?
It just seems the way politians frame their debates, its to deflect attension from the real issues. Like how neither party will admit the reason for war with iraq is an oil grab, and how the so called fix for social secruity is realy a crutch for the stock market and brokers, and how no one talks about the impending crisis in medicare, which will go bust 20 years before social security does.
I agree with voting them all out, and outsourcing their jobs. I gotta believe we cant do worse.

 

Maybe you can give me some insight as to why you think the war in Iraq is an "oil grab". I see no signs of oil production increasing nor prices dropping. Is it just that we want to control it? How about we boot reconstuct OPEC and see what happens as well?

 

Why is the price of oil going up? Could it be , the world is past the halfway mark of oil suppiles, and itll only get worse? Our whole economy is based on cheap oil. If the oil supply were cut off, america would be hurtin. Bush is just making a stategic grab while we still can.
What would make you think other wise? Hasnt every other reason they gave been proved to be a lie? From wmd( which the british press has had a field day with...but the american press is prevented from publishing those facts), to democracy( we dont even have a democracy), to fightlng terrorists( isnt it getting much worse? maybe not here...but there)? Whats the one topic they will not discuss? oil.
If you read this article, youll see why its about oil.
article
And like the article says...people cant stand too much reality...its too unpleasant.

 

Well the problem is that Social Security is anything but an untouched pool of money. It's all spent and gone the day it hits Washington DC. Every penny of it.