A question for the DU community... If Social Security is an insurance program that we fund..

[Peacetrain]

its not a tax program we vote for year after year.. how in the heck do the republicans even begin to think they have some sort of say so over it.

[fescuerescue]

1. I don't know that I would qualify it as an insurance program

But generally Congress does have say over pretty much everything money wise.

That's why it's important to keep control of Congress away from the Republicans.

[Peacetrain]

2. I would call it an insurance program, because we have to pay into it and get a benefit at the end

but I guess more than anything, I am stumped at how someone like Pence for example.. want to turn it into a private fund for each individual to invest as how they feel... We all now how that works out.. I just do not see where they can play around with it like a cat with a ball.. but that is exactly what they want to do..

[Delmette2.0]

19. I think Social Security is a Trust Fund.

We get access to our contributions when we retire.

Bonus is if we are ever disabled we can receive a benefit that is not connected to our retirement contributions.

[Hortensis]

28. SocSec is a retirement program.

Insurance covers losses, which hopefully will not occur; but if they do...!

Of course, many expect to have personal assets to retire on, and regard it as mostly an insurance "safety net" in case everything else was lost.

[Xoan]

3. Owning the libs is what they do.

[GoodRaisin]

4. Because Republicans steal.

They don’t care if it’s called tax or insurance, as long as it’s money, they will use any reason to get their greedy hands into it.

[happybird]

5. I'd looove to hear their plan for refunding me, and everyone else my age and younger,

all the money we’ve paid into SS. Because they better have a plan for that. If we aren’t getting our money during retirement, as promised, I want that shit back! With interest!

[debm55]

18. Happy, I agree with you. My money back with interest.

[Mysterian]

6. I keep wondering why they call it an "entitlement."

Makes it sound like some kind of giveaway, not something you contribute to your entire working life.

[Meadowoak]

9. That's what they want you to think, that all your tax money

Is just being given away to lazy people that just don't want to work.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

17. Because RePuQ's gaslight everyone about everything?

This is an example of 'framing', and they do it all the time.

No regards for the factual situation, it's all about greed and political advantage.

[Freddie]

25. "Entitlement" is just a term for an "owed benefit"

Something you already paid into. It’s not meant to be an insult although it’s taken that way.

[Mysterian]

29. I know, but when republicans say "entitlement" with a sneer on their ugly faces...

they're making it out to be a giveaway program.

[Nictuku]

7. It was in a Republican Senate 'plan'

"The president appeared to be referencing a plan released last year by Senator Rick Scott of Florida, then chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which would introduce a five-year sunset clause for all federal legislation. Thus, Medicare and Social Security would have to be regularly renewed in order to remain law."

https://www.newsweek.com/list-republicans-suggested-cutting-medicare-social-security-1779917

[Hekate]

8. Republicans have been trying to gut SS and get their meathooks on the cash ever since FDR...

My late grandfather, whose politics were apparently to the right of Attila the Hun, was a grown man when FDR got it passed, and according to my mother even he approved of it. However, he commented that politicians were never going to be able to resist the temptation to stick their hands in the piggy bank.

[Fiendish Thingy]

10. It's neither insurance nor a "tax program" whatever that is.

It’s a legislated benefit program that nearly every worker pays into, and then earns benefits from. However, it’s the withholding from current workers that is paying a significant portion of benefits of current retirees.

[Hekate]

11. It's your payroll tax, out of every paycheck. So it really is your money in the most concrete form

When I was 15 or 16 the recruiters for summer work at the cannery came to my high school and I got my mom to sign the form allowing me to work there. Payroll taxes came out of each check.

When I worked in a store during the holiday season, also in high school, they gave us a cash wage packet with the taxes carefully enumerated on the envelope.

What the GOP has tried to do and will try to do is sell their grift as a gift: Look! Your take-home pay will go up! How cool is that!

Right. And you can beg on the street when you are old and feeble.

[gab13by13]

12. Republicans want to put the SS Trust fund into the stock market

[moniss]

16. The hedge funds

are salivating at the thought of getting their hands on the money. They will undoubtedly create complicated financial instruments tied to it. Like options on options on options and then have the taxpayers backstop their scheme when it collapses and then they'll start it all over again like they have after the 2007/2008 Great Collapse. The level of derivatives etc. is now a huge multiple higher than it was then. We may ask when it breaks again "what did they expect would happen?" but you can be sure they expected it to happen. In fact they were counting on it. Their model is to build it up on thin air and make tons of money knowing it will break eventually. They also know the government will step in and save the big boys just like the last time with bailouts and 0% loans so they can build it all up again and the cycle repeats over and over. Meanwhile average people are crushed and lose most everything and employment in the chaos.

[Kaleva]

13. In the original legislation, Congress reserved the right to change it

"Congress clearly had no such limitation in mind when crafting the law. Section 1104 of the 1935 Act, entitled "RESERVATION OF POWER," specifically said: "The right to alter, amend, or repeal any provision of this Act is hereby reserved to the Congress." Even so, some have thought that this reservation was in some way unconstitutional. This is the issue finally settled by Flemming v. Nestor....

In its ruling, the Court rejected this argument and established the principle that entitlement to Social Security benefits is not contractual right.."

https://www.ssa.gov/history/nestor.html

There never has been a guaranteed right to SS benefits.

[sprinkleeninow]

20. Then it sounds like a hoodwinking bogus scam by our federal government. nt/

[Kaleva]

21. It's right there in black and white ever since 1935

[IbogaProject]

14. Wall street has become a house of cards

So the wealthy want to get their money out by selling to the public. This is all about putting some of it aside in a so called 'private account' and let you invest it. That would above all exacerbate class divisions.

[Caliman73]

15. Because Conservatives (Republicans are the current political vehicle)...

Do not see it in terms of "Policy" or "Program".

They abhor the idea that people who "Do not deserve" handouts, are getting one. They do not believe that the government should do ANYTHING that prolongs life that is unworthy.

It sounds harsh and unrealistic, but just look at how people within the aristocracy and absolute monarchs thought about the peasants and serfs of the day. There is no indication that Conservative thought has changed since its creation when defending aristocracy during the English and French Revolutions. The only thing that has changed is that Conservatives do not wholeheartedly believe in hereditary nobility. They certainly still believe that the "natural" structure of society is a pyramid and that "the best" are blessed by "god" or "nature" to lead. Same thinking as the Kings, Queens, and nobles had in the 17th, 18th, and 19th Centuries and before then.

[inthewind21]

22. Schoolhouse Rock

How a bill becomes a law. it'll explain it all.

[LiberalFighter]

23. Keep in mind that it is not just the 6.2% that Republicans would have to pay back.

But also the 6.2% employers had to pay in. That employer 6.2% should actually be considered part of our wages.

[Zeitghost]

30. Nothing would have to be paid back

When we pay our SS payroll tax it in no way guarantees us anything in the future.

[Xolodno]

24. You would also be surprised just how many idiot repub voters..

...think that cutting it will help with the deficit. Social Security can go bankrupt, but it would have no effect on the Federal Government as they are two different accounts. Spending for military, infrastructure, national parks, NASA, etc. come out of the general account and that's where we have a deficit.

Social Security, Medicare, etc. are a different account and not tied to GA. But you got plenty of stupid out there who think they are smart and don't have a fucking clue.

If we need to fix solvency of Social Security, sure, then raise the contribution, raise the retirement age for Gen Z, etc. If they want to enhance it with a "savings account", fine keep the contributions and attach an automatic IRA that gets deducted from your paycheck so you don't have to physically do it.

[Freddie]

26. It's like Medicare Advantage, charter schools, private prisons

They want to get rich at the taxpayer trough (with brokerage fees etc.) Eliminate the middleman? They want to BE the middleman.

[blue neen]

31. Exactly.

All the Republicans do is sit around and dream up new ways to scam us.

[Meowmee]

27. yep

if they are getting rid of it I want all the money I paid in refunded in one payment so I can invest it. And not taxed!