Many of the elderly retirees are already forced to choose between living in a vehicle or paying rent and starving. If SS is still a thing by the time im old enough to retire that monthly check wouldnt be enough to even afford a hyperinflated big mac let alone rent.
NGL im kind of halfways on that. Yes obviously thinking about investment and ways to make up passive income or even start your own buisness are the best ways to plan for a healthy retirement fund.
But people who come from poverty, poorly educated to begin with, poor financial mindset, and just scrapes each week are going to have a much harder time of it and if they try they usually fall for an MLM scheme. Its easy to judge these people and go ‘well your financial failure to save up is your own fault you idiot’ but Ive had enough poverty stricken friends to know that the deeper the hole you are born into the harder it is to climb out of even with honest work and educating yourself through the internet.
Either earn enough or become super frugal and cut down on the expenses to the point you can actually save with what you make The biggest thing a single person can do to reduce their expenses is cut out the rent payments by living in a vehicle for a bit while working and use that money to pay it off. But obviously not everyone has the mental fortitude to adapt to such a radically different lifestyle or freedom from responsibility to do so even if they wanted to.
Everything else aside, social security is not going to run out in 10 years, all the doomsday is if we do NOTHING, but we never do nothing on social security. It’s not going to end or “go bankrupt”, this is all fear mongering BS that doesn’t stand up to the smallest dose of objective reality.
To make SS solvent all they need to do is make higher income earners contribute on the same scale they make lower income earners pay already.
If people making above 140,000ish had to keep contributing at the same rate as everyone UNDER that number does, there would be no issue at all. But a billionaire pays as much into SS as someone making 140k a year, probably LESS because of the Social Security payroll tax income limit.
Back in the 90s, people were saying the same thing. Al Gore even had an early internet meme made about him saying “lockbox” over and over.
Ten years later I looked into it, and the sense at that time was all the illegal immigrants were contributing in but didn’t have a chance of taking the money out, and that saved it.
Did Trump screw us over by changing “catch and release” to “Wait on the other side of the border?”
It is not going to “run out”. That is republican talking point and propaganda. God damn that myth is believed by everyone.
The concepts of solvency, sustainability, and budget impact are common in discussions of Social Security, but are not well understood. Currently, the Social Security Board of Trustees projects program cost to rise by 2035 so that taxes will be enough to pay for only 75 percent of scheduled benefits.^1
75% of benefits will still be paid in even the worse case scenario. The fear mongering is not necessary.
I know this is false because I’ve looked into how it works, and it still makes me feel sick to hear every time. Of course, the truth is bad enough, we don’t need to lie.
GenX here. Got some free financial advice in 1993 or so. Asked about Social Security being cancelled because my entire class ('89) said we didn’t expect to receive it.
She looked me straight in the eye and said, “No. There will be riots in the streets before Social Security is cancelled. This is a non-issue, you’re getting it. Any other concerns?”
GenZ, 30-years later, “We’re gonna get cancelled!”
No fuck you won’t. Old people vote. Isn’t that what they’re always bitching about? Think we’ll shoot our retirement straight in the skull?!
However we do have the worst case scenario of 75% of planned hanging over our heads. In the next ten years or so, either we’ll take a big hit on income or there will be painful changes to prevent it. I don’t like either of those. Like everything else we can’t seem to do, the best fix is to do it ahead of time to greatly reduce the impact. It is important that Congress get off their asses and address it now so whatever adjustment will hurt less.
Previous adjustments have included raising the cap, taxing more benefits, raising the retirement age, and changes to the formula for cost of living adjustments. We really ought to consider a balance of all those and more so we spread the pain
Also Gen X, graduated in '96, and was warned by my econ/government teacher that we need to have well funded IRAs, because we won’t be getting enough social security benefits to even pay for food, much less rent, medicine, or healthcare.
This is what they mean when they say Social Security is basically bankrupt. It won’t pay for shit, and I live with people who currently draw on SS. It already doesn’t even pay the 1/3 of their retirement it was supposed to. We don’t get the retirement plans (pensions) from the companies we work for that was supposed to cover that last 1/3 of our retirements.
Social Security doesn’t have assets, it has debt obligations, which to the government, are something you can conjure out of thin air. The only senses in which it can “run out” is if outlays exceed receipts, or if it runs out of debt instruments to cash out and has to ask for a pile of more debt instruments.
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$168,600
That’s the cap. It is clearly and obviously only benefiting the rich. Absolutely insane.
It also benefits the upper middle class. And middle class in HCOL areas.
It should be adjusted based on cost of living.
Making $150k in NYC is like making $50k in middle america.
I literally do not care about the upper middle class.
👍
Many of the elderly retirees are already forced to choose between living in a vehicle or paying rent and starving. If SS is still a thing by the time im old enough to retire that monthly check wouldnt be enough to even afford a hyperinflated big mac let alone rent.
ShOuLd HaVE saVeD sOmE DAmn mOnEyyy…
NGL im kind of halfways on that. Yes obviously thinking about investment and ways to make up passive income or even start your own buisness are the best ways to plan for a healthy retirement fund. But people who come from poverty, poorly educated to begin with, poor financial mindset, and just scrapes each week are going to have a much harder time of it and if they try they usually fall for an MLM scheme. Its easy to judge these people and go ‘well your financial failure to save up is your own fault you idiot’ but Ive had enough poverty stricken friends to know that the deeper the hole you are born into the harder it is to climb out of even with honest work and educating yourself through the internet.
Exactly. You have to earn enough in the first place to save enough.
Either earn enough or become super frugal and cut down on the expenses to the point you can actually save with what you make The biggest thing a single person can do to reduce their expenses is cut out the rent payments by living in a vehicle for a bit while working and use that money to pay it off. But obviously not everyone has the mental fortitude to adapt to such a radically different lifestyle or freedom from responsibility to do so even if they wanted to.
“life is too expensive to be sustainable…”
“HAVE YOU TRIED BEING HOMELESS?”
Everything else aside, social security is not going to run out in 10 years, all the doomsday is if we do NOTHING, but we never do nothing on social security. It’s not going to end or “go bankrupt”, this is all fear mongering BS that doesn’t stand up to the smallest dose of objective reality.
To make SS solvent all they need to do is make higher income earners contribute on the same scale they make lower income earners pay already.
If people making above 140,000ish had to keep contributing at the same rate as everyone UNDER that number does, there would be no issue at all. But a billionaire pays as much into SS as someone making 140k a year, probably LESS because of the Social Security payroll tax income limit.
Tax the rich already!
Eat them, but ok.
I’m good with either.
Libs going to lib
No, it isn’t. That’s bullshit, a talking point designed to get you to give up on supporting it politically.
But do you know what would help it in actuarial terms? 2 things:
raise the federal minimum wage
remove the cap on income subject to the social security tax
When suppressing wages became a bipartisan affair, it hurt Social Security just as much as it did workers on the low end of the wage scale.
Also make the SS fund separate from the general fund and make the general fund (aka the military) pay back what they took from SS originally.
100%? That doesn’t sound right. If all the money goes to Social Security, what will be left for the IRS to take?
Back in the 90s, people were saying the same thing. Al Gore even had an early internet meme made about him saying “lockbox” over and over.
Ten years later I looked into it, and the sense at that time was all the illegal immigrants were contributing in but didn’t have a chance of taking the money out, and that saved it.
Did Trump screw us over by changing “catch and release” to “Wait on the other side of the border?”
It is not going to “run out”. That is republican talking point and propaganda. God damn that myth is believed by everyone.
75% of benefits will still be paid in even the worse case scenario. The fear mongering is not necessary.
I know this is false because I’ve looked into how it works, and it still makes me feel sick to hear every time. Of course, the truth is bad enough, we don’t need to lie.
GenX here. Got some free financial advice in 1993 or so. Asked about Social Security being cancelled because my entire class ('89) said we didn’t expect to receive it.
She looked me straight in the eye and said, “No. There will be riots in the streets before Social Security is cancelled. This is a non-issue, you’re getting it. Any other concerns?”
GenZ, 30-years later, “We’re gonna get cancelled!”
No fuck you won’t. Old people vote. Isn’t that what they’re always bitching about? Think we’ll shoot our retirement straight in the skull?!
!remindme 20 years
However we do have the worst case scenario of 75% of planned hanging over our heads. In the next ten years or so, either we’ll take a big hit on income or there will be painful changes to prevent it. I don’t like either of those. Like everything else we can’t seem to do, the best fix is to do it ahead of time to greatly reduce the impact. It is important that Congress get off their asses and address it now so whatever adjustment will hurt less.
Previous adjustments have included raising the cap, taxing more benefits, raising the retirement age, and changes to the formula for cost of living adjustments. We really ought to consider a balance of all those and more so we spread the pain
Also Gen X, graduated in '96, and was warned by my econ/government teacher that we need to have well funded IRAs, because we won’t be getting enough social security benefits to even pay for food, much less rent, medicine, or healthcare.
This is what they mean when they say Social Security is basically bankrupt. It won’t pay for shit, and I live with people who currently draw on SS. It already doesn’t even pay the 1/3 of their retirement it was supposed to. We don’t get the retirement plans (pensions) from the companies we work for that was supposed to cover that last 1/3 of our retirements.
They will make laws to change it but grandfather in people born before a certain age
Social Security doesn’t have assets, it has debt obligations, which to the government, are something you can conjure out of thin air. The only senses in which it can “run out” is if outlays exceed receipts, or if it runs out of debt instruments to cash out and has to ask for a pile of more debt instruments.
Image Transcription: Twitter Post
Social Security Works, @SSWorks
A worker making $50,000 a year contributes to Social Security on 100% of their income.
A CEO making $20 million a year contributes to Social Security on less than 1% of their income.
It’s time to scrap the cap!
Could someone explain how it could run out if there are still workers contributing to it every year?
Population contraction and major shifts in wages compared to cost of living.
it’s not gonna run out.
it will be far worse, we’ll all pay into social security and when we get it back it won’t cover the cost of your monthly bread ration.
Fucking lazy-ass boomers getting my money.