30-05-2003 00:31									#151
	Increase Your PM Length

quote: Originally posted by Ned However I do agree with the NPR cut, but would extend this to public broadcasting and support of the arts in general. NPR is representative of all of these. It and they have become so far left in their political orientation as to be completely unacceptable.

IMO, the question of whether government should support these at all is entirely independent of ideological content of specific programs. On the scale of the Federal budget, though, the amounts are trivial, and it's a lot less limited powers infringing, or rights infringing, than say, the Department of Education or the war on drugs.

If you take ideology out of the picture, and look at a matrix between proper exercise of Federal power and fiscal impact, NPR and NEA have to be pretty far down the list. Killing off unfunded mandates to the states is also a higher priority, though one without a direct fiscal impact for the Federal government.

	30-05-2003 00:35									#152
	Tired of ads?

BTW for anyone who's interested here is a link to the complete national budget.

	30-05-2003 00:38									#153
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin Environmental Assessors can do well though most of the consultants end up doing Phase I & II work and living hand to mouth. You really have to work your butt off in order to compete in a low margin business like EA. Still, it’s one of those businesses which someone can break into. As a Geologist I work in the environmental field and I've thought about trying to start my own small constancy in 10 years or so. The big problem is most of the large (read: profitable) jobs are multidisciplinary so you either have to have a large staff who knows about each specialty or you end up outsourcing (both eat up profits in no time). Thus the only way I can think of to get into the business is to work for small clients who mostly want Phase I/II work so they can complete due diligence prior to sale or for mortgage lenders who are trying to decide wither a piece of real-estate is worth owning or not. Both are a commodity type service.

I know a couple of people who do that here (southern Cali, not Baja), as individual consultants. One's a Chem Ph.D, who specializes in air quality permits and does Phase I and II work, the other a Marine Bio Ph.D who does fisheries and riparian habitat stuff, also Phase I and II work. They both bill around $120 an hour, and are in a lot of demand with smaller developer firms who get to know them and spread the word, because as clients they don't like the cost and bloat of the bigger firms. If you're a little fish, you have to expect to work for little fish, but if you develop a good reputation for cost and good service, you get a lot of referral clients.

	30-05-2003 00:39									#154
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin Lastly, BBC has an excellent article about how Bush buried a Treasury Department report which stated the current Tax and spend attitude of the Bush Administration was completely unsustainable and that the US would be unable to meet its social obligations to baby boomers (who are already beginning to retire) due to the record deficits. This tax cut was absolutely criminal.

They may have got their tax cut passed but this will be an issue in 2004, especially if the economy is bad.

	30-05-2003 00:43									#155
	Full PM-box? Change here!

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin Lastly, BBC has an excellent article about how Bush buried a Treasury Department report which stated the current Tax and spend attitude of the Bush Administration was completely unsustainable and that the US would be unable to meet its social obligations to baby boomers (who are already beginning to retire) due to the record deficits. This tax cut was absolutely criminal.

The current tax and spend, or borrow and spend situation is unsustainable, but I'd rather see tax cuts with spending cuts, than the present levels. Social Security and the boomers is just a ticking time bomb, so the Feds need to get some balls and phase out of that business entirely. Due to the huge vested funds into the SS system and how much dicking around with that money is ingrained into budget gamesmanship, the phase out has to be gradual, and has to be set up to not screw people who are mostly paid in, but the political case needs to be made now, and made continuously, that SS is just another Ponzi scheme, and something which has to be kicked back to private pensions and related systems.

	30-05-2003 00:48									#156
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat The current tax and spend, or borrow and spend situation is unsustainable, but I'd rather see tax cuts with spending cuts, than the present levels. Social Security and the boomers is just a ticking time bomb, so the Feds need to get some balls and phase out of that business entirely. Due to the huge vested funds into the SS system and how much dicking around with that money is ingrained into budget gamesmanship, the phase out has to be gradual, and has to be set up to not screw people who are mostly paid in, but the political case needs to be made now, and made continuously, that SS is just another Ponzi scheme, and something which has to be kicked back to private pensions and related systems.

Don't look for benefits for the elderly to be cut. The elderly will be more powerfull politically when the boomers retire than they ever were. No, unfortunately work will probably be taxed so much it will be ridiculous. There is some hope though that the boomers will be sympathetic.

	30-05-2003 00:57									#157
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

MtG, as I'm sure you know, just mentioning Social Security is political suicide.

The blue hairs have immense political power. Unlike most other demographic groups, they vote.

-Arrian

	30-05-2003 01:07									#158
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

MtG: It sounds like your friends do pretty well for themselves. Maybe I should go to grad school and pick up an extra degree.

Everyone else: So where do we cut? The three biggest budget items are Social Security, Medicare, and the Military. The first two are off limits because anyone who touches them is a political corpse so that leaves only the military as the major cut point and lots of smaller cuts in just about everything else.

So where can the military cut corners? Well, it doesn't make sense to pay to develop a new wheeled APC since we already have the bradley, and the Sea Wolf attack sub is not needed, the F-22's only competetor is the F-15 but it costs twice as much, and why the heck do we need a Super Honet (upgraded F/A-18) to be an air superiority fighter when we already have the F-15 and the F-22? Kill the sub the armored vehicle and one of the planes.

What's next? The new "super rifle" is a total peace of crap (weights to much, costs to much, breaks to often, and needs batteries(!!!!) so it gets cut. We still have base closings to consider; remember we have five bases all doing basic training but we have half the forces of 12 years ago. They closed Ord but I bet we could close 2 more and still get by just fine and the other branches could probably find similiar underused bases. Much of the nuclear arsonal is a waste so we should sign another treaty with th Russians (maybe even get the Chinese in on it too) and get ride of it.

Anything else? Yep, Bush has passed a million and one subsidies on to big business. Everything from Agrobusiness, to steel, to paper & pulp produces have gotten cash out of Bush during is quest to get reelected. All the subsidies need to go. Hopefully, Bush will be smart enough to sign a treaty with the Euros forcing them toi ditch the subsidies as well (lord knows they are ten times worse). Still, I doubt this will close half of Bush's massive deficit so we're still going to have to cut way over the 20% mark (remember we left S.S. & medicad walk free) in order to balance the budget.

Will Americans stand for a 33% cut to education, to infastructure, and to every other government survice? I doubt it. That is why even after the massive cuts we will still have to roll back much of Bush's three tax cuts.

	30-05-2003 01:11									#159
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

We can first take back that 15 billion we are giving for the AIDS "cause"... what BS

	30-05-2003 01:12									#160
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

I agree with MtG on social security. The problem is that with any phase out (even gradual) you have a smaller and smaller number of people paying in while you have a larger and larger (at least initially) group of receipients. In order to make this even remotely feasible, a limitation to the receipients receiving the amount actually paid in will be the minimum necessay to be able to maintain any type of Social Security program. (And even this appears doubtful).

The only possible solution is a whopping tax increase. If this happens it will probably come in the form of mandated pensioning rules for business. However it goes down, the economy is looking at a severe hit it the next fifty years.

	30-05-2003 01:22									#161
	Support Apolyton

Deficits will be necessary. That's all the more reason to try to keep them to a minimum right now. Otherwise it's going to make borrowing tough and expensive.

	30-05-2003 01:32									#162
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

Kidicious, you are right on. Let's don't forget the massive inflation spiral the government will force to try to devalue its debt when this happens.

	30-05-2003 01:48									#163
	Inflate your Upload Space

I say Republicans and the president get some guts, and tackle Social security straight on: they should do what they truly want to do, abolish the whole system! Think of the savingsd! Just by that, all the tax cut is payed for. But be sure to do it in 2004, abou 2 months away from the elctions, and make sure to claim full credit for it! The people of the US will surely vote how they would feel with that!

As for the side argument. The rich in this country benefit more from the systems in place than anyone else. Does someone who makes 120,000 k a year pay more in income taxes? Yes (like my family), but we also get more out of the system than someone who makes 30,000, and my family does not lack anything we need cuase we pay for programs that help someone making 30,000k. I higly doubt that anyone here making 100k plus (or thier family) lacks something they need, though perhaps you may lack somehting you want. Well, tough.

	30-05-2003 02:02									#164
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Money Magazine has a great article on the $44 trillion dollar hole we're going to have in our budget once the boomers retire and Bush gets his latest tax cuts.

Bush is resorting to creative accounting that is so shameless that even Enron would have blushed. Can you believe the administration is claiming it will only be an $18 billion dollar short fall once you project out growth for 75 years!!!!!!!!!!!!! WTF? 75 years of uninterrupted prosparity is what Bush is counting on to get us out of his budget mess? This idiot needs to be shot for his incompetence.

BTW here's the quote from the CNN/Money article that I'm using as a source.

quote: It's important to keep in mind, however, that the $44.2 trillion is a theoretical number -- the White House, which chooses to project just 75 years into the future, sees an $18 trillion shortfall -- and any number that goes too far into the future is likely to be fraught with uncertainty.

	30-05-2003 02:17									#165
	Put an end to popups!

Here's another great quote from Money Magaizine/CNN dealing with the Treasury department's own internal evaluation of Bush's lastest tax cuts (see BBC article linked to above):

quote: Gokhale asserts that fixing the massive shortfall he projects -- assuming the government chooses not to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits -- soon will force the government to pick from an array of even nastier poisons, including: boosting individual and corporate taxes 69 percent raising payroll taxes 95 percent cutting non-Social Security and non-Medicare spending 56 percent eliminating all other federal government spending or some combination of each of these four measures

Dispite what Rush Lame-brain may say Bush is leading us into a financial train wreck of epic proportions all because he can't control his spending nor his desire to give handouts to political friends.

	30-05-2003 02:20									#166
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Originally posted by Arrian MtG, as I'm sure you know, just mentioning Social Security is political suicide. The blue hairs have immense political power. Unlike most other demographic groups, they vote. -Arrian

Of course, that's why I said it would take balls. The thing is, you have to pay off the old folks - they've put tons of money in, and counted on what they expect to get out.

The thing is to pay them off, and make the case to the younger generations that the system is broken as is, and it's just going to cost them more and more now to get less and less later.

My general framework is anyone with less than five years to go before minimum retirement age just keeps going with the present system. Between five and ten years, you have the option to stick with the present system, or take a partial phase out - any percentage you want, but if you opt out, you (and your employer) now pay that money you would have paid in FICA taxes into a qualified private plan - self directed, or what have you. Those with less than ten years but more than five paid into the system get a one time tax free (if it goes into a qualifying plan) lump of 100% of what they've paid in, but the employer's matching side stays to partly handle the buyout of the old folks. Those with less than five years into the system, too bad, you wouldn't have seen a dime anyway.

Between ten years from first paying into the system (mostly 26-28 years old), and ten years from first being able to get paid out of it, you have the bulk of the taxpayers, and the money going in. Those people would phase out fully or partly according to a sliding scale from what they've paid in and for how long, although you would have some optional incentives to have people opt out entirely.

The goal is to get out of the SS game over the course of a generation (at least wrt new beneficiaries), so that people highly paid in and current beneficiaries don't get touched, but people just into the system have plenty of time to make other plans, and people in the middle can mix and match between SS and taking tax free lump sums to put into private plans.

As far as financing it goes, the privatized pension money should grow a lot faster as privately managed tax deferred investments (and yeah, you can satisfy socialists and the clueless who don't want to learn what to do with their money by creating appropriate regulations for what kinds of plans and investment mixes qualify), and when it comes out of the pension plans over a number of years, that grown money is taxable income. Another way of financing it is with a special series of tax exempt long-term bonds, so that you can handle the current payouts of those who want to opt out of the system, as well as provide funds for current beneficiaries in lieu of the younger generations' Ponzi contributions.

Another totally different type of option is to continue the present pay in system, but privatize the admin side, with customer service incentives and penalties to force efficiencies (screw low-bid privatization, in other words), and have private fund managers handle portions of the trust fund - put it all out to private investment, but subject to qualifying criteria, and limit any fund manager to a maximum percentage of fund to manage, with the winners each year determined on a competitive basis of net returns realized (in current income and asset growth categories) in the current year. The best fund managers would stay in the pool, but the lower performing half would be subject to elimination.

This would keep the system superficially in place (as far as visibility of admininstration, payroll withholding and benefit payment), but privatize the working guts behind it on a competitive basis, while directing the funds into qualified investments in the marketplace.

GePap - SS is going to blow up sooner or later. You may as well adress the flaws in it (which does not mean ever increasing SS taxes, which are even more regressive than VATs) before it blows up, than try to clean it up after.

PLATO - a little inflation is nice. Right now, it's been so low for so long that people completely discount the notion of it in spending decisions.

	30-05-2003 04:17									#167
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Privatizing Social Security is a bad idea. The system right now is much more low cost than a private system. We just have to work out this problem with the larger generations.

	30-05-2003 04:33									#168
	Full PM-box? Change here!

I do think we would be better off long term if we had a semi-private system like Singapore has. In Singapore the government mandates a certain percent go into a private account, that the account must be invested according to broad guidelines, but (here's the important part), the government insures the original principle. That's right you will never loss the original amount as long as you follow the government's investement guidelines. All the money on the upside is yours to keep but you can't touch it until retirement.

	30-05-2003 04:36									#169
	Get a bigger avatar today!

It's very low cost for present beneficiaries, yeah.

If you look at what I'm going to get out of it, it ain't so attractive (I'm a couple of decades and change older than you)

If you look at what you're going to get out of it, it's damned expensive. Net negative returns after inflation, anyone?

The problem isn't just the generations - it's longevity, earnings curves, asset survivorship - the whole thing is unsound.

SSA's IT systems are a mess, and their service provision isn't that great - luckily, you don't have to deal with them much, unless you get screwed out of your money, in which case it might take you multiple visits, nearly all-day lines, and a long trip to your nearest SSA office.

If the investment management costs are taken out of return on investment (a la mutual funds), you should still get superior returns to the artificially calculated returns from the SS benefit formulas, with zero net management cost, so the only costs you have to explicitly pay for are the SSA officefront admin and operations costs. Those could be privatized much more efficiently (it's basic retail customer service in a different form). The trick is you make payment to the private service provider contingent on both qualitative customer service as well as quantitative.

	30-05-2003 04:46									#170
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat It's very low cost for present beneficiaries, yeah. If you look at what I'm going to get out of it, it ain't so attractive (I'm a couple of decades and change older than you) If you look at what you're going to get out of it, it's damned expensive. Net negative returns after inflation, anyone?

What are you worried about? You will get your Social Security. Don't worry about inflation. Banks don't like it, so I wouldn't expect it. If inflation gets out of control the whole system is coming down anyway.

	30-05-2003 04:48									#171
	Put an end to popups!

Privatized SS over my dead body! the trick is ti make FICA a progressive tax, it is currently a regressive tax.

If things get too out of hand we can allways resort to revolution!

BTW: I currently get SS assistance.

	30-05-2003 04:59									#172
	Get a bigger avatar today!

quote: Originally posted by Kidicious What are you worried about? You will get your Social Security. Don't worry about inflation. Banks don't like it, so I wouldn't expect it. If inflation gets out of control the whole system is coming down anyway.

Sorry, but I just found this post to be

If banks don't like inflation, explain the 70s-early 80s?

	30-05-2003 05:03									#173
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

In 1979 the Fed slammed us into a severe recession to rid us of double digit inflation. Don't worry about inflation. They'll surely do it again if they have to.

	30-05-2003 05:03									#174
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by Kidicious What are you worried about? You will get your Social Security. Don't worry about inflation. Banks don't like it, so I wouldn't expect it. If inflation gets out of control the whole system is coming down anyway.

Oh yeah. I'll get some trivial amount in relation to the timing and magnitude of my source contributions, and I won't come out ahead of an investment-type limited private pension plan unless I really stick it to the Feds and live to be 112 and milk medicare for half a dozen open-heart procedures. (Not that they pay **** for those compared with costs).

In terms of time-weighted relative rates of return, I expect my SEP earnings (even without the corporate welfare gig) will outperform my SS benefits by at least five to one.

	30-05-2003 05:08									#175
	Remove this text

quote: Originally posted by Odin Privatized SS over my dead body! the trick is ti make FICA a progressive tax, it is currently a regressive tax. If things get too out of hand we can allways resort to revolution! BTW: I currently get SS assistance.

Ah, so take even more money from people to prop up a ponzi scheme that's financially unsound.

That won't work though, because the cap is already so high, that relatively few wage-earners exceed it. Definitely not enough so that raising the cap would bail the system out.

	30-05-2003 05:10									#176
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat Oh yeah. I'll get some trivial amount in relation to the timing and magnitude of my source contributions, and I won't come out ahead of an investment-type limited private pension plan unless I really stick it to the Feds and live to be 112 and milk medicare for half a dozen open-heart procedures. (Not that they pay **** for those compared with costs). In terms of time-weighted relative rates of return, I expect my SEP earnings (even without the corporate welfare gig) will outperform my SS benefits by at least five to one.

The current system is meant to be there for everyone for as long as they live at the lowest cost. You just can't get a comparable system with privitization. Sure you can get a riskier system that is going to let people fall through the cracks and that costs much more, but really people don't want that. Privitization is a gimic and it will only pass if the Republicans can hoodwink everyone and scare them into thinking that the current system is going to fail. It's not going to fail.

	30-05-2003 05:12									#177
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

I'm sure that in time you'll be hearing calls for a removal of the cap from people like Odin, Mike. Not just raising it, but a complete removal of it.

	30-05-2003 05:13									#178
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: It's not going to fail.

If it keeps going like it is, it most definetly will.

	30-05-2003 05:16									#179
	Support Apolyton

quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui quote: It's not going to fail. If it keeps going like it is, it most definetly will.

Why?

	30-05-2003 05:18									#180
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Because of this thing called the baby boomers. There is no way that a small number of wage earners will be able to support a larger number of baby-boomer retirees. The only way to MAKE it work is to take money from the rest of the budget (and it's not going to be small). SS will be used up in a flash and won't even be close to enough to cover the rest.