Well, duh!--- Baby Boomers - Ripped Off By Ronald Reagan (Matt Taibbi/RS)

[kpete]

taibbi:

Social Security was never the cause of the nation's debt problems. This issue dates all the way back to the Eighties, when Ronald Reagan hired Alan Greenspan to chair the National Commission on Social Security Reform, ostensibly to deal with a looming shortfall in the fund. Greenspan's solution was to hike Social Security tax rates (they went from 9.35% in 1981 to 15.3% in 1990) and build up a "surplus" that could be used to pay Baby Boomers their social security checks 30 years down the road.

They raised the SS taxes all right, but they didn't save the money for any old Baby Boomers in the 2000s. Instead, Reagan blew that money paying for eight years of deficit spending and tax cuts. Three presidents after him used the same trick. They used about $1.69 trillion in extra Social Security revenue (from the Greenspan hikes) to pay for current-day goodies, with the still-being-debated Bush tax cuts being a great example. This led to the infamous moment during Bush's presidency when Paul O'Neill announced that the Social Security Trust Fund had no assets.

Well, duh! That is what happens to a fund, when you spend 30 years robbing it to pay for tax cuts for Jamie Dimon and Lloyd Blankfein. It will tend to get empty. But of course this wasn't presented to the public as being the consequence of too many handouts to wealthy campaign contributors: this was presented as a problem of those needy goddamned old people wanting to retire too early and being just far too greedy when it came to actually wanting their Social Security benefits paid out.

And so in all seriousness none other than Alan Greenspan proposed back in 2004 that the "social security problem" be rectified by means of reforms that should sound familiar to those reading the news of late: raising the retirement age and cutting benefits.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/matt-taibbi/blogs/TaibbiData_May2010/239443/83512

[BridgeTheGap]

1. But he was a REAL American who recognized that government was the problem, righhhht? ;-) n.t

[ieoeja]

13. In this case, Reagan was right.

The government he created stole our fucking money. I would have to agree THAT government is a pretty big problem.

[BridgeTheGap]

20. As well as illegally funding the Contra war, allowing CIA "contractors' to deal coke, etc. n.t

[BridgeTheGap]

21. And this from P.J. O'Rourke...

"The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it." ~P.J. O'Rourke

[progressoid]

2. Correction - EVERYONE (but the wealthy) was ripped off by Reagan.

[glitch]

4. And his admirers.

Kindest term for them, I am feeling generous.

[indepat]

3. As I have long proffered on this board: Greenspan, a name that will live in

infamy. Greenspan, the architect of the multi-trillion transfer of wealth from working people to those who already own some 95% of the wealth. It doesn't get much better than this. ;)

[voteearlyvoteoften]

5. am kick

[TexasObserver]

6. recommend

[quaker bill]

7. There are moments when I find Taibbi irritating

This is not one of them. He is dead center on the point here. The biggest tax increase in history, at least at the time, burden placed entirely on the working classes, plundered to the last cent largely for military misadventures and tax cuts for the wealthy.

[rucky]

8. And this is how SS is tied to the deficit.

It's not SUPPOSED to be. Remember when everyone laughed at Al Gore's "lock box" comment?

Same reason why states & corporations are trying to welch on pension funds. They mismanaged them and belong in jail. Instead they attack the workers who've held up their end of the contract.

[midnight]

9. Well said.

[pattmarty]

19. Ya know the REALLY bad thing about corps not standing by their..........

...........legal contracts to pay for retirees? It's the fucking courts ALL side with the corps. Talk about rule of law, the US and state courts regularly let corps out of a LEGAL contract with their employees (who in some cases may represented by a union).

[molly77]

28. Fascism really is all about rich people being able to steal everybody

else's money and get by with it.

[avaistheone1]

10. K&R

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[The Wizard]

12. You may be looking for another source of blame

Handing over the keys to the Treasury to defense contractors and corrupt bankers is where the problem lies, not those who paid into the system in good faith.
Giving tax cuts to the top 2% in a time of war is a bad idea. They are the ones who make profits from war.
It's high time we make the war profiteers accountable and seize their assets. Dick Cheney and his mini me Bush come to mind. And that's just for starters.

[bhikkhu]

15. The "government can't do anything right" argument fails for many reasons

...most notably all the successful social programs all over the world, and in this country as well, administered by government. In any case, government is nothing but a segment of "we the people", and to say that people outside of government (corporations?) are more trustworthy than people inside of government is unlikely.

[Lasher]

14. Does anybody in this thread realize there are US treasury bonds in the SS trust fund?

The trust fund hasn't been stolen or squandered just yet.

[bhikkhu]

16. That's what I have read consistently here

...having been at one time part of the "social security is doomed" crowd due to misunderstanding how it works. As I have been told, income to SS fund is received in cash and immediately transferred to T-bills. Of course that means that SS funds become government-backed debt, though it is still the case that this is quite secure and trusted far more than corporate debt (bonds).

So the fund is full of T-bills - the famous IOU's so derisively and regularly proclaimed on talk radio - while the cash itself is used for more current needs. Given the nature of the system its hard to think of a better way to do it, both for the security of the principal and for the stability of the interest earned. It is worth noting that in every "troubled time" the US t-bills are still considered a refuge for funds world-wide, in spite of all the "government can't do anything right" repugs who would rather have an ideology-affirming collapse than prosperity.

[Overseas]

17. Another excellent article by Matt Taibbi! Describes what bugs me so well.

That Washington faux-centrist consensus.

[pattmarty]

18. Yeah, this has to be the greatest ripoff of the American citizens............

..............by their very own government since ??????????????????????????

[florida08]

22. well yes and no

indeed they have um "borrowed" from SS for anything but what it is meant for. And yes I would use the word stolen. However what they did was to replace the real money with unmarketable bonds, or so we're told. 2.5 trillions dollars worth. The issue is they don't want to pay it back. They are,according to the government website, back by the full faith of the US government.

Well maybe they are and maybe they aren't. Like rucky said..up this thread..it's why they're tied to the deficit. The republicans and the IMF said those bonds should be defaulted on. And now since they're giving more big bonuses with our SS payments it will be even harder for it to survive unless there is a huge national outrcy. It has been discussed here many times from great posters.

The argument is no one is stating we should default on China who holds almost a trillion in bonds..so why are they suggesting to default on us? Simple. Class warfare..marginalize the 97% and replace them with the top 2-3 percent who not only pad their campaigns through PAC donations but a promises of a nice cushy job in case they retire from Congress. Some are saying that only property owners should be able to vote..how long before that happens. Then of course those, like in the game monopoly, with the most property have a bigger vote.

I'm telling you democracy is and has been under attack for a very long time. First you defund them them you change the message. SS is marxism. Lower class living off the upper. It's a lie but what have they said that wasn't? Death panels..killing grandma. Obama isn't an American. And now with the Bush tax cuts extended with the starve the beast assault, and by the way WE are the beast, you can look for the next round of attacks to be SS with the help of some democrats who will remain silent about how we were robbed.

Beck and Limbaugh are already putting out the message of how the democrats are fueling the recession with unemployment handouts.

IMF
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/07/09/the_imf_wants_the_us_government_to_default_on_the/

[mrarundale]

23. ZZZZ. He's so good at reporting old news

Maybe he can get a job with Julian Assange. But he's so hip working for Rolling Stone 'n all. Now, what corporation owns it/him now?? Can't keep track.

[demigoddess]

24. can I tell you something about Reagan?

he gave the military a pay raise, BUT he took away allowances at the same time. (explanation for some people. military get base pay, and then some people get allowances for such things as hazardous duty ie war, being away from the family, being stationed in a high rent area. allowances are temporary and not counted as pay for reasons of retirement pay) So after a pay raise from Reagan and taking away our allowances, my husband actually came in 6 dollars less per pay day. BUT he raised everyone's base pay and then their retirement pay went up. Unintended consequences probably. They just did not think ahead. And this made a problem for the military and the national budget. Reagan thought he was being cute but all he did was screw up.

He screwed up SS by trying to be cute about that too. They should have hired some mathematicians.

[Art_from_Ark]

25. Reagan didn't want mathematicians

He wanted slick-talking salesmen. When OMB DIrector David Stockman pointed out the fallacies in Reagan's math, he (Stockman) was "taken to the woodshed".

[2Design]

26. My mother said he would ruin her old age - she didn't realize

it would have a generation later. The ones who voted him in, like the young people today who believe these libertarian and republican lies. They have no idea these guys have been telling the same stories for decades. They believe unions are bad but don't realize that is how holidays, vacation days, sick days, 40 hour work weeks came into being and as those have been dissolved so have those extras.

[rasputin1952]

27. Reagan was just the fart from satan's ass, bush was the real turd...

between the two of them, "Reagan paving the road, bushII driving down it at 720mph created a huge fiscal hole that is swallowing us up. There are so many fists in the pot it's disgusting just trying to figure out who's who. But this is the GOP for you, they always set the country up for disaster, and then leave it to others to clean up. Remember...hundreds of billions in cash went missing in the Middle East...and that is helping to fund those we are fighting against. Incredibly, we are arming what are called our enemies///leave it to a Republican to come up with that brain fart...:grr: