This is where I need some more information because you start talking about investments and ponzi schemes, and you lose me. Maybe it's too closely related to math, the only subject in school that would send me running and screaming in the other direction. Maybe it's the way I've buried my head in the proverbial sand in order to avoid having to think about anything that is too unpleasant. Or maybe these glimpses I get from the news alerts on my phone are finally beginning to crack through the hardened exterior that I have placed around me. If it's not information about comic books, I check out.
Well, no more! Now, I may be new to the concept of even having a political discussion, but I'm having a hard time understanding, if it is true that Social Security has been whittling away to nothing, why hasn't someone had the foresight to raise taxes? Normally, I would not support raising taxes, since politicians seem to have my skill and expertise when it comes to balancing a budget or deciding how funds are allocated, but even if it is true that the Baby Boomer population has drained dry the Social Security well, then why don't we start thinking of ways to fill it back up? For instance, I'm sure most of the money that Congress squanders on useless deals and bridges to nowhere could be used instead on social programs designed to actually help people.
And I've heard before the arguments that Social Security is a (relatively) new social program, and I've even heard that it's time we finally put an end to what was supposed to be a temporary, depression-era fix, but we have to realize that we are dealing with our current situation and not the situation faced in 1935. Taxes are the lowest they've been since 1958 (Taxes), and I know that I by no means have a clear and complete understanding of how most things work, but it just seems logical that when the money runs out, more must come in to take its place. The primary condition for instituting Social Security is the same now as it was then; elderly people begin to lose the ability to work and provide and care for themselves the older they get. If they are unable to work, and their families are unable to put back enough money to care for them, exactly what are they supposed to do? Many people think that having to rely on Social Security is evidence of poor financial planning throughout one's life. Without having any actual evidence, I can only suspect that this belief stems from the erroneous idea that working means you have enough money. We learned from my example of the young lady working two jobs that this is by no means the case. You can work 60 hours a week, but because minimum wage has not kept up with the cost of living, and because our politicians work so diligently to keep minimum wage the lowest they possibly can, people are simply unable to put back enough money for retirement; they struggle to meet the financial demands of living everyday and providing clothes, food and shelter for themselves and their families. Providing for their own retirement is a pipe dream.
And when I say that people are having to work to death, I was being a little hyperbolic, but then again, not really. What I would like to see is a study detailing the stress that a minimum wage job wages upon the body. Think about not being able to properly care for your family, and compound that by days, week, months and years. Stress does have an enormous impact upon the body, so having to work all the way until one drops dead is nowhere near the solution that I would create if I could push a magic button. The stress of not being able to live a good life, much less a truly productive one, is a problem that can be solved. Doing away with Social Security, or allowing the funds to dry up, seems to me to be a direct attack upon the elderly. But as you say, that is the way of the government. Who do they go after? Children and the elderly--the weakest among us. How many times is education, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security going to be threatened before the rest of us say "enough is enough"?
Do you know I really suspect? I suspect that there is plenty of money in our government's coffers; they just spend it in ways that if we knew, we would not approve of: Government Waste.
And as to how much the government officials make themselves, I would never say that they make too much until I learn exactly what it is that they do in a day. It seems that too much in our country we castigate people for how much money they make--teachers don't make enough (I happen to agree with this one), and athletes make far too much. Education is the only way that people can acquire self-knowledge because the only way to truly know yourself is to understand the world and your place in it. Our government's attack on education must be stopped. But as for athletes making too much money, they draw in huge revenues for the owners of the teams; shouldn't they get a piece of that pie since the pie only exists because of them? NFL Labor Troubles
I realize that my analogy of sports figures and politicians may not fly, but until I know what their exact day to day job description is, I can't know if they make too much. The president's salary doesn't seem so high given the enormous weight upon his shoulders: President's Salary. But what scares me the most is the idea that some believe we should just cut salaries, social programs and education. Why don't we stop building bridges to nowhere and use that money for education, Social Security and roads? Why are we paying for politicians to take an Around The World trip just to look at billboards ads?
The money is there for what we need; we just need to spend it better. And if it's not there, then heavens, raise taxes! In a government that is for us all, it's time we paid in to make sure it can keep protecting us. That is the function of government after all--to protect the weak from the strong.
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