Congress and the media, they ain't fucking ENTITLEMENTS, we've paid all our lives for them
we ARE entitled for a return on what we've paid into, just like the investor class who are running this country into the ground.
Stupid fucks.
= new reply since forum marked as read
another poster who hasn't read the definition of entitlement...
it's the Congress and media bastardizing the word.
Have a grammar cop day.
First, and this is very important in any struggle against the abuse of power, SS is indeed an Entitlement and you should embrace the word and not allow the haughty sneers to dissuade you. You have been paying for the benefits received by the parents and grandparents of those haughty jerks, thus you are Entitled to have their children and grandchildren pay for yours. Allowing them to frame the debate means you are bringing a knife to a gun fight.
Now, as to how SS works. Your FICA taxes are not an insurance premium for which you can expect a guaranteed benefit. There is no risk pool involved and no investments backing up a premium. Nor are they an investment for which you can expect a 'return on investment'. They are called taxes because that is exactly what they are. Money is taken from you paycheck and it is used to pay for the benefits of current SS beneficiaries...in the same way part of your federal income tax dollar goes to funding the military etc. Technically, you have been paying for the benefits of your grandparents' and parents' generation. Your children and grandchildren will pay for your benefits. The SS Trust Fund was created to cover the cost of the huge Baby Boom Generation.... Money collected, over and above what was needed to pay current benefits, was placed in the SS Trust Fund. That fund is now the largest holder of US debt...$2.67 trillion as of May, 2012. In 2010, between the high unemployment and the FICA Tax Holiday, Social Security has a 'shortfall' of around $40 billion....the money to pay current beneficiaries came from the general fund.
There is nothing in the Social Security program that guarantees you will have your taxes repaid should congress end Social Security. That's why the rethugs feel they can go after SS in such an arrogant manner. End the program, thereby reducing taxes while simultaneously wiping out almost $3 trillion in national debt and no one is owed a reimbursement.
Social Security is a Social Compact which most Americans have supported from its inception. It is the one tax almost universally liked. But, just as the fools in congress decided to back corporations when they decided they didn't want to pay for pensions any longer and created 401Ks as a sop to about half of the work force, ignoring the other half entirely, there is a contingent in congress that would like to end SS for no other reason than they think they can get away with it. More small government bullshit, more big business control of the population.
Write to your congress critters and let them know that you have been faithfully fulfilling your half of the bargain for however many years you have been working. That your FICA taxes were used to pay for the benefits received by their parents and grandparents and that you expect, indeed demand, that they fulfill their end of the bargain and keep the program well funded so you will be able to collect your benefits. You are Entitled to those benefits. Remind them that the internet has made it extraordinarily easy to find out exactly how they voted on SS. Furthermore, tell them to read "Social Security: The Phony Crisis" by Dean Baker and Mark Weisbrot.
Questions? 
I hope I didn't bore you with the length of my reply. 
My only objection to the use of the word "guarantee" is that it implies, for many people, a legal status that is not subject to the whims of congress. There is indeed a 'moral' guarantee implicit to the social contract, (which is why people should celebrate the use of the word entitled) but as you know congress does not always behave according to any precepts of morality.
See you around.
I have written this in my emails to all of my so- called representatives and when they do bother to have their interns or their computer write back they always fucking mention their concern about "entitlements". Makes my blood boil. I've been paying into the funds for decades, as well as having my tax dollars pay for their pensions and mighty fine health insurance and they have the nerve to talk about entitlements.
