Niki Haley proposes some common sense changes to Social Security. (will it hurt or help her?}

[kyzr]

Because of double taxation probably.
#1 SS & Medicare are taxed when the wages were earned. Taxing them again when pensions are disbursed is taxing the same dollars multiple time.
#2 In terms of 401K's, that isn't the state/local/federal governments money. Once earned and deposited into the 401K the money is solely the property of the owner of the account (once earning are considered vested). The state/local/federal government has no ownership of money in a 401K.

WW

1. We agree on redefining income to mean ALL sources, and then tax it at the normal rate, including SS & Medicare.

2. Maybe I'm wrong thinking that defined benefit pensions are untaxed until received? My wife has a defined benefit pension and we pay income taxes on the money she receives. Same as my 401K. So the question is, should SS & Medicare get any revenue from tax deferred income received after retirement? Unless SS & Medicare taxes come out of the gross pay, but only income tax is deferred until after retirement?

3. Did I pay SS & Medicare tax on my gross pay, or after the deduction for my 401k was taken? I have no clue.

 

[Natural Citizen]

When one of these assholes says "common sense", run for the hills.

Or BOHICA....

 

[kyzr]

Screwing me out of 12.4% of MY money over and above the cap is NOT a small change. Especially considering how much I'm getting whacked at the higher income tax brackets on that money already. I'll be working for 30% on the dollar how is that fair? So get a 2nd job and pay your own share you mooching deadbeat rat bastards!

Like I said before, the lower incomes pay the full amount of the SS tax. There is no cap on their net pay.
So stop whining and be glad you are a high earner.

 

[kyzr]

Wrong. The mooching deadbeats hate that I only have to pay what they pay for the exact same benefits. That chaps their ass. Because they want to mooch off me.

They are NOT the exact same benefits. The more you pay, the higher the benefit.

 

[Flash]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/05/politics/nikki-haley-social-security-medicare-reform/index.html

I have always wondered, "WHY ON GOD'S GREEN EARTH ARE MILLIONAIRES AND BILLIONAIRES RECEIVING SOCIAL SECURITY CHECKS?" Niki's plan makes sense, even though some of the details are wonky at this early stage. This has go to give her a leg up (pardon the pun) on the rest of the repub field...especially the insurrectionist named trump.

Well, 'Miss George Bush With Tits', the reason billionaires get Social Security is because like all Americans that worked and paid into the fund they are entitled to get some of that money back.

However, I suspect that very few billionaires actually bother to sign up for the checks.

 

[Mac-7]

LMAO the old government 'pull my finger' trick. It was already reformed. Government forced us to pay gobs more into the trust fund and what did government do with the surplus? YES THEY STOLE IT AND SPENT IT. Ahem, I'm sorry borrowed it without any means of paying it back. $2 trillion and spent it on other government crap. We have no reason to trust the government won't do the same thing again.

As for Medicare, same story. Obama stole $500 billion to fund his Obamacare government handouts.

What you say is true

Big government has been doing that for years

 

[Flash]

The only real common sense thing to do with Social Security is to phase it out. No need to have the government take 7.5% of your money and another same amount from your employer with the promise that you might get some of it back one day, maybe.

 

[Rawley]

Social Security deductions are only taken from income up to $160,000. However, Social Security payments are based on all income earned. So the very rich pay in a very small percentage of their income, but can end up getting really big Social Security checks.

SS benefits are capped too.

 

[BluesLegend]

Like I said before, the lower incomes pay the full amount of the SS tax.

So do I, for the exact same benefits. Just admit it, you want to mooch off me.

 

[BluesLegend]

They are NOT the exact same benefits. The more you pay, the higher the benefit.

Up to the max benefits, at which point paying more gives you no further benefits. I called you out on mooching, you are dancing around that fact.

 

[Greenbeard]

LMAO the old government 'pull my finger' trick. It was already reformed. Government forced us to pay gobs more into the trust fund and what did government do with the surplus? YES THEY STOLE IT AND SPENT IT. Ahem, I'm sorry borrowed it without any means of paying it back. $2 trillion and spent it on other government crap. We have no reason to trust the government won't do the same thing again.

As for Medicare, same story. Obama stole $500 billion to fund his Obamacare government handouts.

When Obamacare passed, 45 years of steady real per beneficiary Medicare spending growth abruptly stopped and hasn’t resumed since. That's saved the country almost $4 trillion so far and substantially improved the financial outlook for the program.

Obama didn’t “steal” from the program, he made it vastly more sustainable. All real spending growth on Medicare since then has been due solely to growing enrollment as people age into the program, not per beneficiary cost growth.

 

[WorldWatcher]

1. We agree on redefining income to mean ALL sources, and then tax it at the normal rate, including SS & Medicare.

2. Maybe I'm wrong thinking that defined benefit pensions are untaxed until received? My wife has a defined benefit pension and we pay income taxes on the money she receives. Same as my 401K. So the question is, should SS & Medicare get any revenue from tax deferred income received after retirement? Unless SS & Medicare taxes come out of the gross pay, but only income tax is deferred until after retirement?

3. Did I pay SS & Medicare tax on my gross pay, or after the deduction for my 401k was taken? I have no clue.

Social Security and Medicare taxes are based on gross income.

“Pre Tax” for 401k applies only for income tax purposes.

WW

 

[WorldWatcher]

Keep wealthy people from having access to SS funds. That's a start. They are against working people.

“Wealthy” is a qualitative term, not a quarantine term.

Define wealthy?

Remembering the money people have needs to last 20-40 years.

WW

 

[kyzr]

Social Security and Medicare taxes are based on gross income.
“Pre Tax” for 401k applies only for income tax purposes.

WW

Can we also agree that there should be no one who does not pay into the SS & Medicare systems, even if they have their own pension plans?

Federal, state, and local governments should all be in SS & Medicare, correct?

 

[ScorpioRising007]

All you deadbeats looking to demonize the 'rich' why don't you losers get a 2nd job and pay your own damn bills. Stop trying to steal our wealth!

I believe in Robin Hood economics. One of my favorite books and movies of all time is Robin Hood. He is my hero. I already have a 2nd and 3rd job I do for extra money in additon to my fulltime job. It is not the rich I see working hard, but those who work multiple jobs and still can't pay the bills.

I will say taking away SS from the rich is really not a bad idea. Redistribute the money to the homeless and poor. Redistributing wealth is a good thing, it will stop a lot of shoplifting, robery, looting, burgarlies. The rich are really the ones truly guilty of these crimes they made these individuals commit these crimes by their selfish hoarding of their money. Redistributing wealth is the first step to solving these problems. So I think Nikki wanting to take SS away from the rich is a very smart idea.

 

[WorldWatcher]

Can we also agree that there should be no one who does not pay into the SS & Medicare systems, even if they have their own pension plans?

Federal, state, and local governments should all be in SS & Medicare, correct?

Not an easy question to answer, the "bumper sticker" reaction to those that address the question will probably be yes. However for those that think beyond the bumper sticker that answer isn't as simple for a few reasons:

#1 In 1983 the law was changed. Prior to that there was the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) was phased out and replaced with the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS). After that date new hires were not eligible for CSRS, they were automatically part of FERS. Existing CSRS employees were given the option of staying in CSRS or transitioning to FERS. Under CSRS, employees were not eligible for Social Security, however FERS employees do pay into Social Security. Since we are talking 40 years ago, the number of Federal employees still in CSRS is a very small portion of that population and it gets smaller by the day as those employees (if even still working) are transitioning to retirement now.

So in terms of "Federal" employees being in Social Security, they already are.

**********************************

#2 About 72% of State and Local employees are already part of Social Security. Of those that aren't 75% are concentrated in 8 states. The remainder are states where in general state and local authorities already participate in Social Security, but certain sections may not. Those that are often excluded include classes of employees grouped together as "First Responders". The reason is because of the physical demands of the job, they often work shorter careers and can retire earlier. Then probably going on to do other work. A similar concept with the military. I myself had a Naval career and moved on to a 2nd career in information systems. Neighbor across the street was a State Policeman, before retiring he started a small business and upon retiring it became his full time occupation.

As a general concept do you really want 67 police, fire fighters, and paramedics being the responders to crimes, fires, and natural disasters? Where these people instead of retiring at 40'ish after 20 years are just trying to hold on to full retirement age of 67? To me that doesn't make sense.

**********************************

#3 The budget impact projection (included in the literature below) show that mandatory conversion to 100% of state/local workers into Social Security would actually make things worse. Remember, because they aren't in the Social Security program, they are not eligible to receive benefits for employment in that job.

It shows that in the short term inclusion of those currently under an alternative/equivalent retirement plan would result in a short term 5% increase in funding, but that funding disappears and it would actually have a negative impact as they retire. Why? Because short term revenues would increase, but so would benefits - however they have not been paying into Social Security for decades meaning they were not contributing to the Social Security Trust Fund which was supposed to get us through the baby boomer bulge. Because they weren't paying into the "reserve" trust, ALL of their benefits would have to be paid from current revenues.

So mandatory conversion of state/local employees does not improve the social security situation.

**********************************

#4 The state/local governments that don't cover certain workers under Social Security are required by law to provide benefits at least as good as Social Security. Where states/local governments have opted out, they have a structure in place to pay those level of benefits. Where state/local governments opted into Social Security, they may still have a retirement system in addition to Social Security, but typically those benefits are designed to work with Social Security to provide for retirement income.

What I mean by that is in the opt out states, ALL retirement income comes from the fund. In states like Virginia, you pay part of each paycheck into VRS to fund retirement and pay Social Security. Your VRS is lower as a result. I'm looking at retirement in a year or two and my combined VRS + Social Security will replace about 78% of my working income. A decease in gross income sure, but one that is manageable with other things that change in retirement.

**********************************

#5 Then finally (for this post) you have answer the question of "how to transition to mandatory 100% participation?" Just like with the transition from CSRS to FERS the only reasonable way to do it would be to phase it in over time based on new hires and where existing/older employees are given the option to transition or remain with their current plan.

You'd be thinking of time horizons measure in decades (probably 4-6).

In addition, state/local legislative bodies would need to totally revamp their pension programs to align with the change in concept from "Our programs provides full retirement benefits without Social Security to we want the same level of coverage so we have to reduce our benefits to work in partnership with Social Security". That would be a nightmare.

WW

https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R46961/2

https://www.nasra.org/socialsecurity

 

[22lcidw]

When Obamacare passed, 45 years of steady real per beneficiary Medicare spending growth abruptly stopped and hasn’t resumed since. That's saved the country almost $4 trillion so far and substantially improved the financial outlook for the program.

Obama didn’t “steal” from the program, he made it vastly more sustainable. All real spending growth on Medicare since then has been due solely to growing enrollment as people age into the program, not per beneficiary cost growth.

Medicare growth has increased exponentially. All those old people cost money for medical services, and it is growing in numbers. In 1970...the government spent 7.5 billion dollars on Medicare. In 2022 the government spent 900 billion dollars on Medicare. And it is rising way past inflation.

 

[22lcidw]

Not an easy question to answer, the "bumper sticker" reaction to those that address the question will probably be yes. However for those that think beyond the bumper sticker that answer isn't as simple for a few reasons:

#1 In 1983 the law was changed. Prior to that there was the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) was phased out and replaced with the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS). After that date new hires were not eligible for CSRS, they were automatically part of FERS. Existing CSRS employees were given the option of staying in CSRS or transitioning to FERS. Under CSRS, employees were not eligible for Social Security, however FERS employees do pay into Social Security. Since we are talking 40 years ago, the number of Federal employees still in CSRS is a very small portion of that population and it gets smaller by the day as those employees (if even still working) are transitioning to retirement now.

So in terms of "Federal" employees being in Social Security, they already are.

**********************************

#2 About 72% of State and Local employees are already part of Social Security. Of those that aren't 75% are concentrated in 8 states. The remainder are states where in general state and local authorities already participate in Social Security, but certain sections may not. Those that are often excluded include classes of employees grouped together as "First Responders". The reason is because of the physical demands of the job, they often work shorter careers and can retire earlier. Then probably going on to do other work. A similar concept with the military. I myself had a Naval career and moved on to a 2nd career in information systems. Neighbor across the street was a State Policeman, before retiring he started a small business and upon retiring it became his full time occupation.

As a general concept do you really want 67 police, fire fighters, and paramedics being the responders to crimes, fires, and natural disasters? Where these people instead of retiring at 40'ish after 20 years are just trying to hold on to full retirement age of 67? To me that doesn't make sense.

**********************************

#3 The budget impact projection (included in the literature below) show that mandatory conversion to 100% of state/local workers into Social Security would actually make things worse. Remember, because they aren't in the Social Security program, they are not eligible to receive benefits for employment in that job.

It shows that in the short term inclusion of those currently under an alternative/equivalent retirement plan would result in a short term 5% increase in funding, but that funding disappears and it would actually have a negative impact as they retire. Why? Because short term revenues would increase, but so would benefits - however they have not been paying into Social Security for decades meaning they were not contributing to the Social Security Trust Fund which was supposed to get us through the baby boomer bulge. Because they weren't paying into the "reserve" trust, ALL of their benefits would have to be paid from current revenues.

So mandatory conversion of state/local employees does not improve the social security situation.

**********************************

#4 The state/local governments that don't cover certain workers under Social Security are required by law to provide benefits at least as good as Social Security. Where states/local governments have opted out, they have a structure in place to pay those level of benefits. Where state/local governments opted into Social Security, they may still have a retirement system in addition to Social Security, but typically those benefits are designed to work with Social Security to provide for retirement income.

What I mean by that is in the opt out states, ALL retirement income comes from the fund. In states like Virginia, you pay part of each paycheck into VRS to fund retirement and pay Social Security. Your VRS is lower as a result. I'm looking at retirement in a year or two and my combined VRS + Social Security will replace about 78% of my working income. A decease in gross income sure, but one that is manageable with other things that change in retirement.

**********************************

#5 Then finally (for this post) you have answer the question of "how to transition to mandatory 100% participation?" Just like with the transition from CSRS to FERS the only reasonable way to do it would be to phase it in over time based on new hires and where existing/older employees are given the option to transition or remain with their current plan.

You'd be thinking of time horizons measure in decades (probably 4-6).

In addition, state/local legislative bodies would need to totally revamp their pension programs to align with the change in concept from "Our programs provides full retirement benefits without Social Security to we want the same level of coverage so we have to reduce our benefits to work in partnership with Social Security". That would be a nightmare.

WW

https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R46961/2

https://www.nasra.org/socialsecurity

So, Haley will continue massive outlays for wars, welfare and money to illegals just to start.

 

[WorldWatcher]

Medicare growth has increased exponentially. All those old people cost money for medical services, and it is growing in numbers. In 1970...the government spent 7.5 billion dollars on Medicare. In 2022 the government spent 900 billion dollars on Medicare. And it is rising way past inflation.

While I don't disagree with the fact that medical costs themselves have skyrocketed, there is another factor.

That is the shift from corporate elimination of Defined Benefit Pensions (which often included retirement medical) to the emphasis on 401K based retirement savings (which don't include medical) meaning more people have to use Medicare instead of employer medical benefits.

The Demise of the Defined-Benefit Plan and What Replaced It

Defined-benefit plans are a thing of the past for most private-sector workers, but there are other ways to shore up your retirement.

www.investopedia.com

WW

 

[DBA]

I will wager anyone here that the repubs are gonna shoot down taking a dime away from the 1%ers.

Trump capped the SALT deduction. Rich Democrats went ballistic. You have been duped.