Quote from piezoe:
Good, now we are getting somewhere. It's a matter of your personal philosophy. Though i think it is short sided, and not in your best interest, I won't argue with it. It's your right to think as you do, so long as your thinking doesn't harm others. That's the part I'm not so sure about.
To answer a few of your questions: 1) The low wage earner's risk is in dying young before they receive a return commensurate with their contribution.
2) correct, the current employer/employee contribution is 12.5% (I think.) -- its been reduced just recently. Supposedly that's temporary.
3) No, I don't realize that.
4) I don't think so. I think this isn't just true of very low wage workers, but those in the lower half of whats left of the middle class as well. They also have, in general, too little disposable income to properly fund an individual retirement account.
All of your points boil down to "I decree that the Federal government shall take from some to give to others". It's mob rule.
Can't you just admit that rather than resort to ludicrous rationalizations?
What you are also enabing is for young low wage (and now you're bringing the middle wage earners in, too) workers to substitute other types of current consumption over retirement savings, which is another prioritization of consumption over savings which distorts capital formation. You're basically saying to them, "Go buy that flat screen because Uncle Sam's got your back for retirement". Is that really the most socially-beneficial message to send? If individuals had that 12%+ of income that they contribute and their employer contributes to SS, that would be more than adequate to fund a retirement account that they would OWN rather than one subject to shifting benefit rules and other program changes. Why don't you want poor people to own capital? You'd rather they depend on the whims of bureaucrats and politicians? How many of those poor could leverage that ownership into other things, such as starting their own business without the need for bank loans? You are a typical narrow-minded supporter of a "least common denominator" society where choices and freedom are circumscribed to narrow options that simple-minded people can handle. Yet, I'd be shocked to find that you consider yourself anything but a broad-minded person. You just don't know what you don't know.
Actually, if you put contributions into a private account, the risk to the low wage earner of dying too young would dissolve because his ownership of that account would enable him to leave it to his family, including non-relatives, who would not be eligible for survivor's benefits. Heck, he might even leave it to a charity he likes. Point being, it would be his to do with as he saw fit, rather than locked up in a giant pool of money.
Please find me even 5% of workers who remain "low wage" their entire lives. Do these people never upgrade their skills? Do they never get promoted in their workplace? They just do the same menial work for 50 years? Even a guy who starts on the frying station at a fast food place gets promoted to manager or goes to college some day.
Finally, you do realize that black men do not, on average, live to collect SS equivalent to their payroll tax contributions, right? And that the primary beneficiaries are white women? Why do you hate black men so much that you'd take their money to give it to white women? Are you a racist?
As for my "short-sighted" views, you may recall that I was the one saying that programs like SS and Medicare, which distort individual incentives to save, should only be put in place if they can be shown to be sustainable for centuries. Yeah, I'm soooo short-sighted. We know what works for centuries and it's private ownership of capital, i.e. private retirement savings.
