The Social Security Trust Fund report came out yesterday, and there has been very little of the usual hysteria. What is going on?
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.
Battle won, war still ongoing.
We still have time to mess this up!
They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!
Accountability, motherfuckers.
Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.
Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?
Republicans do not pay their debts.
Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.
People are complicated. Love is not.
Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?
They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.
Let’s not be the monsters we hate.
So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.
Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.
American History and Black History Cannot Be Separated
In my day, never was longer.
I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.
No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.
Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?
Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.
And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.
Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?
After roe, women are no longer free.
Nina
It takes time to turn the behemoth around. Just wait until the weekend, they’ll all have their talking points coordinated.
flukebucket
I heard this morning that it was going to be out of money by 2033 or something like that. Not to worry. There will be another report out soon saying it will be fine until 2525 and then another that says it will be broke by 2104 and blah, blah, blah.
James Gary
I don’t know…NPR has been doing its best all day to toe the ZOMG GOING BANKRUPT MUST MASSIVELY CUT BENEFITS NOW party line. Maybe you just haven’t been following the media closely enough.
Hunter Gathers
I don’t pay attention to that kind of shit anymore, being as I’m convinced that my Social Security will be used to fund an invasion of Mars, since Martians have the temerity to worship a dirty, orange God. The discovery of large amounts of Martian oil prior to invasion will be explained away as a ‘coincidence’ by POTUS George P. Bush.
j
Morning Joe was lying about how “it’s going BROKE” this morning.
terraformer
Oh, I’m sure they’re huddled in a room composing the official line, which will soon be distributed throughout the nut-o-sphere and we’ll hear all about it forthwith. Just have patience.
Bob
First things first: Columbian prostitutes!
Anonymous At Work
What do you expect? The openly-partisan critics of Social Security don’t want to debate the underlying reason why the Trust Fund report is pessimistic (that the openly-partisan critics are keeping people unemployed and/or receiving less wages). The non-partisan critics of Social Security are busy working with/inside Americans Elect to promote one of their own and don’t want either to split their efforts or to draw attention to themselves.
dollared
Because they won the message war. Don’t sell past the close, you know.
Doc Sportello
I wonder if the financial institutions, who were big backers of privatization, have their hands full undoing Dodd-Frank.
But I’m sure the Sabbath gasbags will inform us of the need to do something very stupid about this.
Hunter Gathers
Who cares? We all know that the Social Security trust fund will used to fund an invasion of Mars 15 minutes after the Martian Ambassadors reveal that they have never heard of Jesus, or Prosperity Jesus for that matter. The large amounts of Martian oil discovered just prior to invasion will be explained away as a ‘coincidence’ by POTUS Tagg Romney.
Culture of Truth
Pete Peterson spends Mondays instant messaging his buddies about “Game of Thrones” and “Girls”
butler
In order to freak out about the report, you have to read it (or at least acknowledge that it exists). Most of the conventional wisdom on SS makes it clear that the annual report is largely unread and unknown. Why even bother, since everyone knows that SS is DOOMED! Which is based on the fact that… everyone says its doomed?
Also, as bad as the report might be, even the headline blows up the party line about how “we have to do something now or SS will come to our homes and eat our children”. 2033 is about a thousand years from now in political terms.
kindness
I saw the ‘ususal suspects’ trying to use the report to make the case we need to cut Social Security. They say that when you ask them if it’s raining so what’s the diff?
Martin
Well, if you have an honest position with regard to an issue, it’s easy to respond quickly – just speak honestly.
If you are lying through your teeth every time you open your mouth on an issue, then you need to organize about how specifically you’re going to level the next lie without getting caught.
Culture of Truth
Everyone in Washington is busy. Social Security reform will have to wait for the safe return of Katie.
Corner Stone
Kevin Drum has bought the Pete G Pete frame, lock stock and etc.
http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/04/economy-deteriorates-so-does-social-security#disqus_thread
FlipYrWhig
I was sparring with ignorant people on Facebook about it all yesterday. The fear, she is mongered.
Comrade Dread
I don’t pay attention to that kind of shit anymore, being as I’m convinced that my Social Security will be
used to fund an invasion of Mars, since Martians have the temerity to worship a dirty, orange God. The discovery of large amounts of Martian oil prior to invasion will be explained away as a ‘coincidence’ by POTUS George P. Bush.lost in the Wall St. Casino after some bubble was inflated based on some confusing algorithm on which everyone bet the farm and which could never possible burst and take out the nation’s retirement fund bursts and takes out the nation’s retirement fund.I am perhaps more pessimistic than you.
TaMara (BHF)
OT: The President will be down the street from me this afternoon. I’m thrilled, but planning on ducking out of work early to avoid the traffic nightmare it is sure to cause. I suppose that makes me a fair weather Dem, doesn’t it?
Forum Transmitted Disease
@dollared: Yep. We’re no longer discussing the merits of shooting yourself in the balls, we’re just haggling over the number of rounds and the caliber to be used.
Been paying into that fucking fund since I was 13 years old, and they are doing everything they possibly can to insure that the year I’m able to retire will be the year it goes away.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
As usual, Charlie Pierce nails it:
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/Social_Insecurity_At_Play
Be afraid, very, very afraid. If the Romneybot gets elected and has both/either Houses to play with, you’ll see them bring up the Worst President Ever’s SSN Piracy Plan within a week of the inauguration.
Culture of Truth
also we need to panic over the coming Obama seizures of our guns…. and everything else.
japa21
@Hunter Gathers: The Martians worship Boehner? I didn’t know that.
Face
This is great news for Cindy Sheehan.
bobbo
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
and a good number of our proud Democrats will jump on board.
FlipYrWhig
This is a case where Bob Somerby, now well past the deep end, has been strong over time. As I recall, the doomsday scenario is something like a 20% benefit cut. That is, if no one ever fixes anything at all about funding or benefits, when we get to the zero hour, that would be the cut. And yet every fucking time it comes up in the media, everyone acts like at the zero hour nobody gets anything because the coffers are empty. It’s total bullshit and a disgrace that anyone ever falls for it. And in a world full of genuine long-term political, social, economic, and environmental problems, the fact that Social Security panic has any kind of hold on policy-makers is astonishingly, breathtakingly moronic.
lamh35
OT, but does R-Money and the R-Money Millionaires really think they can go toe to toe with POTUS on this one?
Obama On Student Debt: Michelle And I ‘Got Poorer Together’
eyelessgame
Everything’s in a holding pattern until we find out whether Justice Kennedy agrees to destroy healthcare.
kindness
@Corner Stone: Yea I know. Kevin Drum is killing me on some of these issues. For a Liberal, he sure sucks the WaPo teet and he doesn’t even work for them.
Notice how no one is saying if we eliminate the current cap on paying into Social Security the program would be solvent for another 100 years. But that would require the rich (and everyone making more than $109K) to pay more taxes.
lamh35
Oh and CLASS WARFARE!!!
Obama Rips Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC) For Student Loan Comments
Culture of Truth
Kennedy’s out looking for Katie
Doc Sportello
For what it’s worth, you can save Social Security in one step — by eliminating the taxable maximum amount so that income above $106,800 is subject to Social Security taxation.
And if you were to treat capital gains as regular income, Social Security could increase benefits as well. All by closing some loopholes enjoyed by the well-off.
AA+ Bonds
election
Culture of Truth
oh Congress, you won’t like Obama when he’s angry
AA+ Bonds
Most importantly, the Ailes/Murdoch crew appears convinced that ‘hookers in Colombia’ is the way to go this week
Who knows, maybe so, this country is weird about sex
Shari
@eyelessgame:
this
Marcellus Shale, Public Dick
throw them a dog bone and they will chew on it in peace.
El Tiburon
Vaginas!
El Tiburon
Also, this is the sub-headline from the article:
“Social Security fund will run out three years earlier than earlier projections due to boomer retirements, weak economy. If Social Security fund runs out, retirees will get 75 percent of promised benefits.”
My bold, but if it runs out, then where does the 75% payout come from? It doesn’t make any sense.
AA+ Bonds
@El Tiburon:
It would never make sense because people will receive benefits anyway
They might as well get a quote from an ‘expert’ who makes up some number or another
Corner Stone
@El Tiburon: Oh thank Heavens!
I was afraid that was passé.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@AA+ Bonds:
__
It isn’t always about seeking political advantage with these folks. Sometimes they have to stoop so low as to make sure that revenue is flowing in so the bills get paid. Gotta have eyeballs for that. And given that at least half of their audience for these Secret Serviced stories are middle aged men getting vicarious thrills fantasizing about a pr0n-tourism trip to the southlands with men-in-black attire and wraparound shades, well there you go…
__
They’ll be back on-message next week.
FlipYrWhig
@El Tiburon: It’s asinine, isn’t it? It’s like one of those math problems where the faucet is running to fill the tub at a certain rate, the drain is draining at a certain rate, and instead of worrying about the tub actually running dry, they’re worrying about when the faucet falls behind the drain. Well, look, geniuses, you’ve still got close to a full tub even then! I seriously cannot fathom why any halfway intelligent person would choose to worry about this issue, and not, say, irreversible climate change or the waning of fossil fuels… OVER THE SAME DAMN TIME HORIZON. Fucking a.
AA+ Bonds
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Oh of course
I would never assert that those people’s interests align 100% with the Republican Party at all times
I’m just saying that without them leaning on this story, no one will bring it up because the Democrats have a sitting president and this is an election year
Roger Moore
@El Tiburon:
From whatever current workers are paying. The way SS works is that everybody pays in while they’re working. Current retirees are paid out of that money, with anything that’s left over being invested in the SS trust fund (i.e. a big stack of T-bills). If there’s a deficit, we take money out of the trust fund (i.e. sell those T-bills) to make up the difference. When the trust fund runs out, current employees will still be paying in, so there will still be some money for retirees, just not as much as they were led to expect.
Culture of Truth
@Roger Moore: But the GOP never liked the fund concept anyway, so “Trust Which We Could Never Rely on Anyway To Run Out in a Few Decades” would be more accurate for them.
FlipYrWhig
@Roger Moore: Still it’s a dumb concern. It’s like being concerned that your college fund will take a hit when the kid goes to college. No shit, that’s what you’ve been saving up for! It’s a truly dumb policy discussion.
jl
@Roger Moore: thanks. I think what you said is exactly right.
There are two social security ‘crises’. One is a real problem, but I don’t think is crisis. Over long term, consensus on most probable forecast is that current structure of Social Security will pay 75 to 80 percent of future scheduled benefits. This is not a real crisis because it it could be fixed with only minor tinkering, as one of the leading experts on demography and social insurance puts it.
The long run funding problem is also useful for a benchmark, since any American Elitist or GOPper who comes along with a reform plan that purports to save Social Security needs to promise you at least that much in scheduled future benefits for their scheme to be a replacement (even if nothing at all is done to increase revenues for current Social Security program).
And, there is a moderately high probability that Social Security will be able to pay 100 percent of future scheduled benefits. Though admittedly, counting on a ‘a moderately high probability’ is not a good way to run an insurance program, so it would be a good idea to do some minor tinkering.
The other crisis is bogus. Soon the US government will have to start paying back all the money it borrowed from Social Security trust fund to finance the Bush tax cuts. That is not a crisis, it is the US government keeping its promise to honor its debts.
jl
@jl: important to note that even if Social Security does have a long term shortfall, and no tinkering at all is done with payroll tax ceiling etc, paying out 75 to 80 percent of scheduled future benefits will mean a real increase in Social Security payments for most future retirees compared to today.
Won’t be adequate to keep relative position of retirees in income distribution with rest of population, but will be a real increase compared to today’s benefits.
Remember that, when you hear scare stories about cuts if nothing is done.
Roger Moore
@jl:
Oh, it’s real all right. It’s just that it’s a manufactured political crisis rather than an economic crisis, rather like the debt ceiling crisis in 2011. That was no less a crisis for all that it was manufactured by a bunch of idiots with (R
) after their names.Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
Do the projections assume that the payroll tax rate eventually goes back to 6.2%? Because IMO we are stuck with the “temporary” rate of 4.2% for the forseeable future.
Which would make the situation even worse.
liberal
@FlipYrWhig:
Why do you think so?
I’m not disagreeing, in many ways I think he’s jumped the shark, but I’m wondering what you (and also DougJ) have to say.
El Tiburon
@Roger Moore:
DING DING light goes on. I see: the FUND will go bankrupt. This is the FUND that Reagan/Maestro created in the 80s by raising taxes on the middle class to fund the retiring Boomers?
So the fund will be empty, but due to current workers, benefits will continue to flow.
How come Reagan/Ayn Rand’s Bitch fix a problem but we can’t fix it today. I wonder why that is…I really do wonder.
Also and too this: whatever happened to all of the IOUs in the filing cabinet that Bush found? I hope someone locked it up.
Jesse
@El Tiburon: Huh? It’s not like FDR put his personal savings in the SS Trust and we’re all just burning through it now waiting for the tank to hit “E”. If the fund goes bust, there will still be big payments coming in every day from workers around the country. Not enough to raise the fund beyond zero, but there will be money.
El Tiburon
@liberal:
I too would like to hear from some SPTM (smarter people than me) on the demise (too strong?) of Somerby. He was required reading at one time – then – I don’t know what happened. For me it was when he seemed to develop a deep hatred for Rachel Maddow – I mean he would just go off for really petty reasons IMO.
I would like to see the old Somerby analyze the current Somerby.
El Tiburon
@Jesse:
Yes, I saw the light and commented on that further down.
dww44
@Corner Stone: There’s a diary by Armando posted around 10am EDT today which takes Kevin Drum to task for his post. He does it with better framing and a clearer eye for the big picture.
Hope this link works.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/04/24/1085962/-Insolvency-Tax-Cuts-Militiary-Spending-and-Social-Security
Shame on Kevin Drum for saying that lefties should admit that SS Trust fund is in trouble and do something about it, i.e. cut benefits and raise taxes. He’s asking for compromise. We all know where that will lead, no increase in taxes and cutting of benefits.
I think we all need to push back against this meme.It is not the time to throw up our hands in frustration. and ignore what’s coming from the right. We need to get behind those voices that can stand abreast of the fear mongering. We need to fight.
Jesse
@El Tiburon: Ah, you’re right, sorry to harp on that. Carry on.
FlipYrWhig
@liberal: I still read him almost daily, but my huge issue with him is that he doesn’t know how to take yes for an answer. For instance, his biggest peeve is that not enough people stood up to challenge the smearing of the Gore campaign by the mainstream media in 1999-2000 while it was going on, and his next biggest peeve is that too few people in the media will revisit those days today. But when anyone DOES point out that it happened, or that Gore never really said something like “invented the Internet” or did something like wear earth toned clothing, he STILL rails at them. Because, in his eyes, it’s too late to make a difference. So you’re wrong to keep silent about it, but you’re also wrong to speak of it. I don’t know what good that dynamic is supposed to do, or where it’s supposed to lead. It’s like arguing with your wife and she just keeps bringing up old arguments instead, and you can’t even admit you were wrong then or wrong now, and there’s no making up, ever.
Also he’s been extremely peculiar about the Trayvon Martin case in his zeal to cudgel MSNBC talking heads for their career-long wrongness. And he has the signal old blogosphere habit of acting like when you don’t address an issue you must be perfectly happy about it, so silence is complicity, and how dare you remain complicit in the face of Peril X or fail to embrace Wonder Y. He’s a weird dude.
jl
@dww44: I would go further, Drum is just wrong and needs to admit he made a mistake. The trust fund was designed to be a cushion, and current run up in trust fund was supposedly designed to ease financing for baby boom retirement. The trust fund is not the main source of Social Security benefits, and never has been. There is no magic size the trust fund should be, though it would be best to have it above zero.
To confuse the relative importance of the trust fund in providing beneifts to funds from current workers is to confuse the relative importance of the minor prefunded part of the program, with the much more important pay as you go part.
FlipYrWhig
@El Tiburon: Oh, yeah, he’s always hopping mad about Maddow. I think his vision of news is the I.F. Stone kind of thing where you soberly build an unimpeachable case from documents, and his vision of politics is that it all ought to be serious business. And thus he hates sloppy conclusions and cutesy antics and analyses of anecdotes, trivia, and stagecraft. So he gets extra upset when someone intelligent does an act when she’s supposed to be using her brain — even more than he abhors an obvious nincompoop like Chris Matthews.
I think he really, truly hates that MSNBC aspires to be an ideologically liberal Fox News with the same (in his eyes) distortions and “fan service” moments. So he’s on a jihad against the whole enterprise now.
PeakVT
@El Tiburon: Because SS is mostly a transfer program from workers to retirees. The trust fund was established and funded with higher withholdings so there would be a way to handle the accounting for the demographic bulge that everyone knew was coming.
FlipYrWhig
@jl: Well said. It’s even built into the “trust fund” nickname, of course. Greenspan’s commission said to set up a fund to be drawn down later. To borrow a phrase from our resident futurist semi-troll, it’s working as intended.
jl
@PeakVT: i think that there has, however, always been a trust with money in it since the program’s inception. But it has always worked like a buffer stock, as one commenter explained above using the water flowing through a bath tub analogy.
But the function of a buffer stock in a pay as you go system is to make it easier to achieve smooth inflows and outflows. It is not, and cannot be, the main source of financing over 60 or 70 year life cycle.
PeakVT
@jl: You’re right. The SSTF is orignal; the higher withholdings started in the late 1970s and were fully implemented in the 1980s. But it’s still an accounting feature designed to wall off the entire program from annual budget battles. Which is a very good idea.
Death Panel Truck
@dww44:
Haven’t you heard? Kevin Drum is The Sensible Liberal!
Ohio Mom
Maybe all the “usual hysteria” was used up here in Cincinnati. The Enquirer thought this topic was worth a banner headline. It’s already deep in the recycling bin so I can’t quote it.
Heliopause
They’re not freaking out because they’ve already successfully implanted the propaganda. They’re playing a long game and will take as much time as they need to steal our Social security.
Interesting thing coming out of the report, though, is the reason for the accelerating shortfall; they project shitty jobs and underemployment into the foreseeable future, hence declining revenue. This is also part of the plan of the Social Security thieves, to get us all into crap-paying retail and food service jobs. But the irony is that if the pixie dust in the Ryan plan actually worked and produced an explosion of well-paying jobs then Social Security would go back to being sound for a longer period.
Sad to say I think George Carlin was right and they will ultimately succeed in stealing a portion of Social Security, but all we can do is keep fighting back.
TenguPhule
I look on the bright side of things, in the event the Rs destroy SS, I will no longer have any incentive not to brutally slaughter them, their spouses and offspring.
Art LeDardeur
Something I’ve been meaning to do every year when the Social Security trustees publish their report and all the politicians say we need to reign in spending –
The actual reports are online back to 1997. and there is one for every year. I picked a few randomly, trying to get a spread of years. I didn’t cherry pick. These are the first ones I looked at.
1997 projection said it would support itself for 15 more years
2005 projection said it would support itself for 25 more years
2010 projection said it would support itself for 15 more years
The latest report, 2012, says we’re good till 2033 – that’s 20 more years.
I also looked at historical data and found that for several years in the 70’s and 80’s the system did indeed pay out more than it brought in.
It’s the “net increase in assets column” that have minus numbers. That doesn’t seem terrible.
ornery_curmudgeon
Every time someone says that Social Security is ‘going broke’ … answer: “Raise the Cap”
Solved.