My guess is that the best solution for Social Security hasn’t even been thought of yet, and without bringing these issues to the floor, with both sides willing to listen and discuss ideas, I don’t know what progress can/will be made.

On that, we can wholeheartedly agree!

I’m not necessarily saying that we need to have private accounts either, but what I am saying is that this is a issue that I think needs to be looked at more closely in Congress, on both sides, and see if there is a solution that would make both sides happy.

My guess is that the best solution for Social Security hasn’t even been thought of yet, and without bringing these issues to the floor, with both sides willing to listen and discuss ideas, I don’t know what progress can/will be made.

The concept of how to fix SS isn’t really that difficult to grasp. It can easily be done by raising the cap on SS taxes (the cap that primarily helps out the rich right now) and/or gradually raising the retirement age as people naturally live longer lives. “End of the world” avoided, period.

I agree that fixing Medicare is a more difficult problem. The way that we fund health care costs in this country is complete & totally ridiculous…just ask any health care provider. We need comprehensive health care reform IMO in order to fix things.

My problem with the fearmongers isn’t that they really want to “fix” social security. They want to get rid of it.

BTW you don’t seem to be reading my posts very well. I say very specifically that these things are difficult to predict. You also challenge my use of government data (asking “how often” it’s actually correct) and then use the exact same data to make your own points. That’s what fearmongers do, not “realists.”

You also don’t know the history of that document, and that the original conclusions were scrubbed by the Bush administration, which forced the trustees to write conclusions more in line with the Administration’s position on social security rather than what the trustees actually believed. But I suppose that doesn’t matter to a “realist” like you.

What do you propose to do about it? Besides eliminating it in favor of “private accounts,” that is.

I suppose, also, you have no trouble with how much money we’re spending in Iraq, either.

– Well, Democrat is a noun. Democratic is an adjective.

You don’t hear anyone saying talking about what the “Democratics” are doing, do you?

http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/trsummary.html

Look at the Social Security shortfalls year after year, the spending is always more than they predicted in the previous year.

What are your thoughts on the idea of spending over 30% of GDP just on entitlement programs? If those prospects aren’t a crisis, then I don’t know what it is.

Finally, here is the Summary of that OASDI Report You Cite, pay attention to the conclusion:

“Social Security

The annual cost of Social Security benefits represented 4.3 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2007 and is projected to increase to 6.1 percent of GDP in 2035, and then decline to 5.8 percent of GDP by 2048 and remain at that level. The projected 75-year actuarial deficit in the combined Old-Age and Survivors and Disability Insurance (OASDI) Trust Fund is 1.70 percent of taxable payroll ($4.3 trillion in present value terms), down from 1.95 percent projected in last year’s report. This decrease is due primarily to changes in projection methods. Although the combined OASDI program passes our short-range test of financial adequacy, the Disability Insurance Trust Fund does not; in addition, OASDI continues to fail our long-range test of close actuarial balance by a wide margin. Projected OASDI tax income will begin to fall short of outlays in 2017, and will be sufficient to finance only 78 percent of scheduled annual benefits in 2041, after the combined OASDI Trust Fund is projected to be exhausted.

Social Security could be brought into actuarial balance over the next 75 years in various ways, including an immediate increase of 14 percent in payroll tax revenues (from 12.4 percent to 14.1 percent) or an immediate reduction in benefits of 12 percent or some combination of the two. Ensuring that the system is solvent on a sustainable basis beyond the next 75 years would require larger changes, because an aging population and increasing longevity cause the projected current-law OASDI cash-flow deficits to be substantially larger after the 75-year projection period than they are on average during the period.

The projected actuarial deficit in the OASDI Trust Fund over the infinite future is 3.2 percent of taxable payroll (1.1 percent of GDP), or $13.6 trillion in present value terms. The system could be brought into actuarial balance over this time horizon with an immediate increase in payroll tax revenues of 26 percent (from 12.4 percent to 15.6 percent) or an immediate reduction in benefits of 20 percent, or some combination of the two.

Conclusion

The financial difficulties facing Social Security and Medicare pose enormous challenges. The sooner these challenges are addressed, the more varied and less disruptive their solutions can be. We urge the public to engage in informed discussion and policymakers to think creatively about the changing needs and preferences of working and retired Americans. A national conversation and timely political action are essential to ensure that Social Security and Medicare continue to play a critical role in the lives of all Americans.”

—

So Sickle, what’s so wrong about taking their recommendation and addressing these challenges?

We’re not fear mongers, we’re realists.

“Will Barack Obama admit that he wants to raise the cap on the amount of income susceptible to Social Security taxes?”

I think he’s already done that several times…another tax increase on the mostly rich IMO.

“Will Hillary Clinton talk about why she opposes giving younger voters a personal account that they own and control?”

Well, if this question is about privatizing Social Security, we’ve already had that national conversation, and you guys lost, again. Doing that puts a huge hole in the funding source for *actual* SS benefits that still need to be paid to people that are retired/retiring. I’m personally in favor of allowing all Americans access to the same set of options that federal employees & Congress currently have access to under the TSP…outside of SS monies though.

Why do you guys always say “Democrat” instead of Democratic BTW? It seems foolish to me.

That’s why the data I cited above (which no one bothered to challenge) is so important. It shows that the Social Security fearmongers are wrong. (How I can cite and quote the fearmongers and yet be accused of being “ignorant to differing opinions” is pretty bizarre, too.) But there’s more than just this.

The 2007 OASDI Trustees Report states “Social Security’s combined trust funds are projected to allow full payment of scheduled benefits until they become exhausted in 2041.” In order to ensure full benefit payouts for 75 years, the payroll tax would need to be raised 1.95%. That’s not exactly a “crisis” figure. And it may not even be necessary to do so. As we have repeatedly seen, the date at which social security will become “insolvent” has been moved many times in the past twenty years, and is getting later and later in time.

Look, there has been a decades-long attempt by certain groups of Republicans to get rid of social security in favor of private investment. And the story’s always been the same: social security is going bankrupt soon and we need to do something! Peter calls it “one of the biggest financial problems this country has ever faced.” Trouble is, it’s not. Not by a long shot. Unless you twist numbers or omit certain data points, there’s no evidence that we’re facing a huge financial shock from which we could never recover. This is fearmongering, plain and simple.