26-09-2002 09:36									#31
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty program the government has.

While this is true... It is also really scarey considering how badly it's managed. It could be so much better.

	26-09-2002 09:38									#32
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

quote: Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty program the government has.

I wouldn't have such a problem with Social Security if they actully limited it to those elderly people who are in need. They don't, however, so I think that claiming that Social Security is a anti-poverty program is a little misleading. It's a forced savings system that isn't guaranteed to pay anyone in my generation back for what we put in. I'd rather keep the money and take care of my own folks, not pay for some well off retiree to get a check every month.

quote: Anyone who even thinks of doing away with Social Security is an evil, rotten, spoiled, selfish brat.

Great tactic. Claim that everyone who disagrees with you is evil. Critical Theory at its best... (sigh)

	26-09-2002 09:38									#33
	Tired of ads?

Do you honestly think yhat your children and grandchildren will allow the government to stop making payments on Social Security? Not only is it the most successful anti-poverty program (so broekn it reduced elderly pverty by half ) but it is also the single most popular government program. Unless the US government falls (or we institute a society like that in Logran's Run), Social Security will always be there. No politician is stupid enough to ever let Social Security go down.

	26-09-2002 09:49									#34
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

I never said that Social Security will be ended. Of course it won't. It won't ever be reformed, either. The elderly are far too potent a voting bloc and too easily scared about SS for any politician to ever buck their opinion and actually make the program workable. Also, the Social Security "trust fund" provides easy access to billions of dollars for politicians to spend on pork and other pet projects. Social Security isn't going anywhere.

A man can dream though...

	26-09-2002 10:05									#35
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Well, there is a 401K, or to get your kids started early, a Ross IRA (I'm pretty sure I screwed that up....).

Anyways, there are alternatives to SS.

Also, there's a cap on SS, so if you're making a couple thousand a year, you will hit that cap, and never pay SS again, and end up with a decent amount for retirement. This provides two points - one, you won't be paying a whole hell of a lot to millionares (comparitively), two you caould always just crank out the big bucjs and get it over over with early

	26-09-2002 10:10									#36
	Remove this text

The cap is $65K in a per year. You pay on your income up to that point, but not over. If were removed the cap, it would go a long way to ensuring the solvence of SS.

	26-09-2002 10:14									#37
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

The only thing that pisses me off is that if I had invested all the money I have put in to SS, I would have over a million dollars available when I retire. Instead, they will send me those measily checks.

But what the heck, it's all one big pyramid scheme anyway, so I just have to keep paying and hope the house of cards doesn't come falling down before I die

	26-09-2002 10:18									#38
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

quote: The only thing that pisses me off is that if I had invested all the money I have put in to SS, I would have over a million dollars available when I retire. Instead, they will send me those measily checks.

Hell, I'll consider myself lucky if I get measley checks sent to me when I'm old. Right now, I'm assuming that I'll get nothing out of SS when I retire.

	26-09-2002 10:37									#39
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

You're assuming the US government will collapse? Dude, I don't even assume that, and I'm dedicated to overthrowing it.

	26-09-2002 10:40									#40
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Why would the US government collapse? I'm more worried about Social Security becoming insolvent decades before I reach retirment age. Unless major reforms occur, it's only a matter of time...

	26-09-2002 10:43									#41
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

As I said, Social Security cannot become insolvent. The government will never allow it to happen. They will find the money to pay everyone what they are owed, because the politicians will all lose their jobs otherwise. The only way Social Security won't be paid is if the government itself becomes insolvent.

	26-09-2002 10:46									#42
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Oh, that's great. So I can pay even more into SS to make sure the mass of baby boomers are completely covered? Will I get more in SS benefits when I retire then? Not bloody likely.

God, I really hate socialism...

	26-09-2002 10:50									#43
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Welfare capitalism isn't socialism. It is to prevent socialism. The whol purpose is to keep the working classes from becoming so mired in poverty and misery that they no longer support the system and try and abolish it.

There are two ways to try and stop us commies. You can buy the working class off with welfare or you can beat the crap out of them with a police state (or some mixture of the two). In the long run, a welfare state is cheaper and less intrusive compared to a police state or a revolution.

	26-09-2002 10:54									#44
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Can I just say here that I really love the fact that a guy with a Malcolm X avatar is whining about baby boomers? Yes, if only the boomers had been more like their parents! Then white folks could have just lynched Malcolm while the law turned a blind eye to the whole thing -- that is, if Malcolm hadn't just remained a numbers runner because there was no climate in which for him to speak to begin with.

	26-09-2002 10:56									#45
	Tired of ads?

I don't really consider you commies to be much of a threat anymore, quite frankly. The fact that your ideology has suffered a complete failure worldwide makes me doubt that the proletariart will be rising up against anyone in the future. I think most working class folks prefer unfair capitalism to unfair and repressive communism. Your movement is dead...

	26-09-2002 12:05									#46
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Just do what I do and become a professional hit man and have all your money under the table…
I have a man holding it for me and it's good: it's like a bank, only better, cause banks always get knocked off, and there's all those forms to fill out, you know?

	26-09-2002 12:07									#47
	Increase the size of your Attachments

quote: Just do what I do and become a professional hit man and have all your money under the table…

What's to say that I haven't?

There's actually an inside joke in my family about me being an assassin. Explains why I sleep all day, as I'm out killing at night...

	26-09-2002 12:30									#48
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: now it's Generation Y (lazy bastards can't even come up with an original name )

It's not us who came up with it, it's Gen-X'ers pathetically trying to feel self-important.

Or wait, was I Gen-X? It all is so confusing.

	26-09-2002 12:37									#49
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

bah! I don't care.

Long as some lazy slackers are going to pay my social security when I retire.

	26-09-2002 12:39									#50
	Full PM-box? Change here!

quote: Long as some lazy slackers are going to pay my social security when I retire.

Good luck on that...

	26-09-2002 12:57									#51
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by Albert Speer Stick a person into a bad environment...

Do you lock 'em up there?

quote: have him know nothing about how he's supposed to act. No one teaches him the right moral behaviour.

There's a whole wide world out there, honey. Check it out.

quote: His parents are broken up.

So? Is that supposed to be a carte blanche excuse for someone being a ****up their whole adult lives?

quote: His mom does drugs.

And back in those righteous, proper days you long for, guess what? People still did drugs if they chose to (ever heard of prohibition? ), or not. What one person does is not excuse for what another one chooses to do.

quote: His father is a deadbeat or in jail.

My nephews' (two of 'em) and neice's (one) father is dead, *******. And guess what? They're great kids, and developing into great human beings. Somebody's dad is an asswipe? Well, that's a good example of what not to do, ain't it?

quote: Have this child go out into a world where nearly everybody has the same basic situation.

Bullshit. That's just your fantasy world whining melodramatic bullshit.

quote: Surround them with drugs and whatever the **** else.

We're all surrounded by everything. Good and bad. What you choose to avail yourself of is your own problem.

quote: If this child does bad is he to blame?

If he or she has the inherent mental capacity to make choices, then yes. If they have a high degree of mental disability then no. And we're talking real disability, not stupidity, a victim complex, or general whininess.

quote: I would blame the people who made this situation in the first place as the ultimate sinners (ie- the baby boomers)

Things were sooooo much better in fairy-tale land.

And you're all set - you've got a whole bunch of somebody's to blame for everything you and your little buddies do in life, from here on out.

Gee, a self-pitying angsty teen blaming his parent's generation for everything wrong in the world. How original.

	26-09-2002 13:10									#52
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

There are two major problems with social security.

1) It's a pyramid scheme, and is prey to demographic swings that can do enormous damage to it. A much better program would have people contribute to their own retirement rather than their parent's retirement.

2) It acts as an intergenerational wealth transfer program in the wrong direction. The wealthiest group of people in the country are old people, yet every one of them whether they are multi-millionaires or impoverished is eligible to receive social security and medicare, and potentially a new prescription drug benefit. Meanwhile, some children are going without medical care at all, when the best bang for the buck could be had in terms of medical spending through preventative medicine for children.

If social security is a welfare program then it should be run like one, with means testing. As it stands now it is more likely that the dollar taken in by social security is being taken from someone who really needs it than it is being given to someone who really needs it.

	26-09-2002 18:35									#53
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

quote: Anyone who even thinks of doing away with Social Security is an evil, rotten, spoiled, selfish brat.

Checking in

quote: because the politicians will all lose their jobs otherwise

Then what we need are some politicians who care less about their jobs and more about doing the right thing (ending Social Security).

quote: There are two ways to try and stop us commies. You can buy the working class off with welfare or you can beat the crap out of them with a police state (or some mixture of the two).

Or, you can bring in a bunch of people from ex-communist countries such as Russia (and I realize it wasn't "really" communist, but then again the US isn't "really" a democracy, it's just what happens when communism or democracy is attempted on a large scale) or Eastern Europe and have them explain how horrible communism turned out to be. Maybe bring in a few people from Stalin's purges...except for the minor fact that they're dead, along with millions of Ukrainian peasants who objected to agricultural communism.

	26-09-2002 18:56									#54
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara The cap is $65K in a per year. You pay on your income up to that point, but not over. If were removed the cap, it would go a long way to ensuring the solvence of SS.

Hmm, typical CHE facts (stuck in the past) . The cap has been raised considerably. I think it's in the 80K range now. I just checked my last paystub and I'm over 72K for the year and I'm still paying SS. Let me find a collaborating site.

Ok, here's one.

http://enquirer.com/editions/2001/0...ton_co_tax.html

States it's currently 80,400. I don't know how reliable this site is, but it's close to what I've experienced, so I'll believe it.

It's gone up 15k in the last four years.

RAH

	26-09-2002 19:21									#55
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Albert, you may want to consider moving to Wisconsin. There's a lot of cheese out there to go with your abundance of WHINE.

On a related note, is personal responsibility truely dead in this country?

-Arrian

	26-09-2002 19:26									#56
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Social responsibility doesn't negate personal responsibility. The two are irrevocably intertwined.

	26-09-2002 19:29									#57
	Got spare money?

quote: that isn't guaranteed to pay anyone in my generation back for what we put in.

Join the club, buddy. I have been paying social security taxes for 29 to 30 years now. With at least a minimum of 13 to 14 more years...( I hope to retire at 59... the age when I can access my 401k without penalty and to use as I see fit).... That makes a minimum of 43 years of SS taxes.

You think I will see every cent I put in? You are dreaming when you think that.

I am a end of the era baby boomer... born in early '57, and I haven't done anything but work, pay taxes, raise a family and help my parents and my wifes' parents when we could.

So, to get some of the money I put into the system, back, seems fair to me. As you probably will get to see some of what you put in, back.

Then someone way younger than you can feel that they don't like to give thier money to older people, because they will never get all of theirs back. And they can complain how it isn't fair to them.

One of my pet peeves is that I hate the sentence "It's not fair". I have no sympathy for anyone who feels that way. That is a reality... things are not fair. Make the best of it, and use the potential you have been gifted with.... Life.

Understand... no one ever gets back every dime they put in. But it helps what you get back. And I am by no means , rich. I use the idea of SS, as a part of my retirement plans. I don't totally rely on it, but I do figure it in to my plans for the future.

As for Speer.... LMAO ... fuhgedaboudit.

	26-09-2002 19:34									#58
	Increase the size of your Attachments

quote: Originally posted by rah Hmm, typical CHE facts (stuck in the past) . RAH

Yeah? Well, I ain't had to do my own taxes for a few years. TurboTax!

	26-09-2002 19:36									#59
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

OldWarrior_42
Couldn't have said it better myself.

	26-09-2002 19:38									#60
	Support Apolyton

quote: Originally posted by chegitz guevara Yeah? Well, I ain't had to do my own taxes for a few years. TurboTax!

My apologies. I assumed your ignorance was because you had never hit the cap limit.

RAH