"Vic Smith" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 08 Nov 2006 23:57:07 GMT, "Calif Bill"
wrote:


You put to much blame on Corporations and stockholders.

Blame for what? I just don't want any broker, corporation or
stockholder getting their hands on my retirement money without my
permission because they bought off politicians to get it extracted
from my paycheck.
Nothing wrong with that.

Where do you get your pay from?

I'm retired now, but might go back to work. Quit my corporate job
this year when the workplace got about half-full of imported
foreigners. Nothing wrong with the foreigners, mind you, but I felt
filthy whenever I was around the "American" execs who hired them to
save a buck for their own bonus.
These "American" execs decided that "shareholder value" demanded that
the resume of a vet returning from Iraq went directly to the circular
file, because the job could be done cheaper by an imported foreigner.
Sorta rubbed me the wrong way, you might say. And I don't try too
hard to hide it when I'm disgusted.
Most Americans don't work for publicly traded corporations, and/or
don't get exposed to these types of slimy CEO's and execs.
But you can see them on any TV financial channel if you're interested
in that kind of thing.
BTW, I sometimes trade commodities as a hobby. I risk my own money,
and wouldn't even think of using my retirement money, much less a
dishwasher's retirement money extracted from his paycheck by some
Wall Street/Fed retirement scheme.

The SS is a mess. There are no funds there. It is a Ponzi
scheme, as the promised rewards are based on the paying base expanding in
regards to the collecting group. And in about 20 years, the baby boomers
and the next boom will have retired and the amount of payers will not be
enough to maintain a good life on SS.

What makes you think the average SS recipient can live a "good life"
on that kind of dough? It's enough to get by with, that's all.
Without guaranteed SS, would you rather have the gov start building
housing and contracting food vendors to keep all the old people alive,
or maybe a euthanasia program?
As to the Ponzi aspect, that was a 50% increase in investment every 90
days scheme, and it lasted about 6 months before it blew up, causing a
number of bank and personal bankruptcies.
SS is a conservative insurance plan, has been around 70 years and has
never had even 1 of *billions* of checks bounce.
If you want to call that a Ponzi scheme, go right ahead.
But understand you lose 20 points for each infraction.
Sounds to me like you're just trying to scare old people (-:

Plus you have all those who did not
pay into the system collecting. An immigrant (legal) on SSI will collect
more than the minimum payments of a working SS recipient. As I think was
Eisboch said, was to keep you from starving and living in a hobo camp. It
has changed to be the middle class lifestyle for the retiree collecting
SS.

It still *is* a hobo type survival for many. The average SS recipient
gets about $1,000 per month. Hardly middle class..
Some get more because they contributed more, or longer. Some
contribute for 50 years, kick off with no survivors, and get zilch.
Means testing has been proposed, but I don't like that idea.
I agree there's a lot of fraud. I see lawyers advertising on TV all
the time on how they will get you SSI. On my vacation in Florida this
year I met at the resort a couple younger than me (59) who were *both*
on SSI disability because of "back problems" yet who seemed to be
moving perfectly fine. You know, in the private insurance industry
fraud investigators save that industry many times the investigators'
salaries. The Feds should do the same with SS.

And where is the money to come from to pay the bills? The money is in
bonds
held by lots of people and foreign entities. We have spent the funds.
Part
of Clintons "Balanced Budget" was the use of SS funds. And I am not just
picking on Clinton, he just tried to claim a balanced budget. All the
presidents and Congress have been using the SS funds to run the country
and
avoid lots of the pain on not overspending.

The source for any Fed gov spending, including SS, is taxes.
TANSTAAFL.
Using current projections, the SS bonds will need to be drawn upon in
about 20 years. The bonds will nominally keep the system paying the
same SS benefits to about 2042.
,As we approach the start of the bond drawdown date in 20 years, the
SS surplus will decrease each year and won't be available for the
general revenue spending bucket. Unless non-SS spending is reduced,
new taxes will have to be raised to pay off the SS bonds. They will
be.
Sometime before the twenty year point is met, either Fed or SS taxes
will be raised to project SS benefits further into the future, maybe
in combination with a payout reduction to SS recipients at the high
end. That's how it will be. Unless we start offing old people at
some proscribed age, or build internment camps with soup kitchens
to let them live out their golden years. I got a feeling taxes will
be raised.
It could be said we are fighting the war in Iraq with invisible money.
The war is real. But the money paying for it is more a matter of
perception and politics than reality. Billions a week, and the
"economy is great."

--Vic
\
Hope you better in commodities evaluation than on the SS and 401K
evaluation. 401K is a free choice item. You can join or not. Most of my
employers over the years had a wide range of choices. Stock funds, bond
funds. And millions of people are employed by publicly traded corporations.
There are bad ones, but the majority are run by good people. Otherwise, you
are accusing all employers of being crooks. Just not noticed if not
publically traded. As to SS, where is the tax money to come from? When you
only have about 3 workers for each retiree. Is even worse in Europe. In
about 10 years, there will be only 2 payers for each retiree. Why there are
lots of public employee strikes in France and Germany. The governments are
trying to correct the situation.