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Email: Social Security Name Change

Discussion in 'News & Current Events' started by LadyEagle, Nov 18, 2012.

  1. LadyEagle

    LadyEagle <b>Moderator</b> <img src =/israel.gif>

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    Email I received:




    Looked it up - here's an article:

    Rest here:

    http://www.aim.org/guest-column/from-social-security-to-federal-benefit/


    Thoughts?
     
  2. Baptist Believer

    Baptist Believer Well-Known Member
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  3. InTheLight

    InTheLight Well-Known Member
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    Members of Congress DO pay into social security.

    Social Security has traditionally been a 6.2% contribution from employee and 6.2% from employer, or a total of 12.4%. So saying it's been 15% per year is incorrect.

    In the past two years it has been 4.2% from employee and 6.2% from employer. It is set to go back up to 6.2% for employees on Jan. 1st.

    (Medicare is 1.45% for employees and 1.45% for employers.)

    The calculation on the lump sum amount one would have after 40 years investing $750 per month is grossly wrong. At 1% interest you would not have $1.3 Million saved after forty years. Instead you would have $428,884.

    So, no, I will not be forwarding grossly erroneous information.

    FWIW, I dislike the term "federal benefit payment".
     
    #3 InTheLight, Nov 18, 2012
    Last edited by a moderator: Nov 18, 2012
  4. LadyEagle

    LadyEagle <b>Moderator</b> <img src =/israel.gif>

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    What is the purpose of changing the name?????

    Don't know about the mathematics, are you sure, ITL? ???? Your figure doesn't seem right to me, either. Can someone explain in more detail? Thanks.
     
  5. menageriekeeper

    menageriekeeper Active Member

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    No name change LE. My SS check came in (direct deposit) titled SSA....Soc Sec... with a bunch of letters and numbers and such that identify me as me. Came in Wednesday, so the email is incorrect in saying the name was changing in Nov. Remind me next month and I'll check on it again for you.
     
  6. InTheLight

    InTheLight Well-Known Member
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    I put it in a spreadsheet, so yeah, I'm pretty sure it's correct.

    Quick and dirty calculation.

    $750 a month X 12 months = $9,000 a year.

    Simple interest on $9,000 at 1% = $90 a year.

    Multiply $9,000 X 40 years = $360,000. $360,000 is the total amount of principal deposited. If simple interest on this amount you would make $3,600 interest in the last year at 1% interest rate. Yes, over 40 years you would have compounding interest working for you, but just for grins, suppose you made $3,600 interest for every year? That would be $144,000 interest over 40 years. Add that to the principal amount of $360,000 and you'd have $504,000, well short of $1.3 million.

    Now, does it seem correct that with $360,000 in principal invested over 40 years at a measly 1% interest would grow to over $1.3 million?
     
  7. billwald

    billwald New Member

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    Social Security IS a universal welfare program which has no guaranteed benefits as an insurance program nor promised benefits as does an investment program. SS money is NOT invested but goes directly into the Treasury by a one step flim-flam and is spent for current budget needs as the law has always required.

    Second, SS discussions seem to always ignore the survivor benefits.
     
  8. billwald

    billwald New Member

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    >The calculation on the lump sum amount one would have after 40 years investing $750 per month is grossly wrong. At 1% interest you would not have $1.3 Million saved after forty years. Instead you would have $428,884

    The point should be that if SS did not exist 90% of American workers woud not invest as much as $750/month and 80% would not invest as much as $75/month.

    http://www.mdmproofing.com/iym/weblog/2011/02/harris-27-of-americans-have-no-personal-savings/

    Harris: 27% of Americans Have No Personal Savings


    http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/16/why-america-spends-while-the-world-saves/


    Why Americans don't save
    Amar C. Bakshi: U.S. household saving rates peaked in the 1980s at around 11 percent, and by 2005, they had plummeted to near zero. How did America go from a nation of savers to a nation of consumers?

    Sheldon Garon: Well, in fact, before World War II we weren’t a nation of great savers. We were a nation of OK savers. Those who did save, saved a lot. But as late as 1910, most Americans didn’t have a savings account. Unlike Europeans and Japanese, they lacked access to savings institutions that would accept very small deposits—such as savings banks and postal savings banks.
    But then in the two World Wars, and particularly in World War II, the federal government intervened to encourage ordinary people to save in ways the Europeans and Japanese were doing at the time.

    The U.S. government undertook two innovations. First, it introduced U.S. savings bonds right before World War II, and they became very popular and very accessible during and after the war. So that was one of the ways people saved and became good savers in America.

    And the other way was the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, introduced in 1934, which guaranteed the deposits of small savers in most American banks. So during the Great Depression and after World War II for several decades, we saved at pretty good rates - between about 7 and 11 percent, from 1946 to the 1980s.

    Then in the 1980s, Americans stopped being good savers - at first slowly and then very rapidly in the 1990s, particularly as housing and consumer credit became available to Americans in amounts unlike anything seen in the rest of the First World.

    First, the credit card industry was deregulated as the result of a 1978 Supreme Court decision. Now able to impose any interest rate they pleased on unpaid balances, credit card firms aggressively expanded their customer base beyond the affluent to target middle and lower income households. By the 1990s, most Americans held not one but several credit cards, and more than half of those cardholders carried unpaid balances.

    Second, home equity loans—which had heretofore scarcely existed—exploded. This occurred after the 1986 tax reform made home equity loans one of the few types of credit in which interest remained tax-deductible.
    From the 1990s to 2005, homeowners borrowed more and more against their equity as home prices skyrocketed. Americans essentially stopped saving. Why save when you could borrow so easily?
    This reliance on easy money came to a crashing halt when housing prices collapsed in 2008.

    Why the Great Recession didn't change American behavior

    Amar C. Bakshi: U.S. household savings increased after the shock of ’08, but then it dipped again. If the financial crisis of ’08 didn’t get us to save more, what will?

    Sheldon Garon: Yes, that’s a very good question. Initially after the 2008 financial crisis and housing meltdown, there were all sorts of media stories that said that Americans were returning to frugality or adopting a new frugality and that savings rates would go above 10 percent.
    And, indeed, briefly, for a couple of years after the 2008 crisis, Americans actually increased their savings compared to where they’d been. Personal savings rates went up to about 5 to 6 percent.

    But in recent months, the savings rate has trended downward, falling below 4 percent (in December, it rose a bit to 4 percent). Those are not very impressive savings rates.

    It is interesting that the crisis didn’t really get Americans - ordinary Americans - to start saving again, partly because so many Americans are now trapped in debt. While more affluent Americans were able to increase their savings rate easily, those in the middle and lower income strata have made efforts to reduce debt, but they are so indebted and have so little savings that it’s been difficult for them to significantly increase saving.
     
  9. Salty

    Salty 20,000 Posts Club
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    In essence Social Security is an insurance program - but it would be term life -
    The difference between SS and Welfare is that recipients (for the most part) DO contribute to the program - where with welfare many do NOT contribute anything.

    good point on survivor benefits
     
  10. billwald

    billwald New Member

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  11. Oldtimer

    Oldtimer New Member

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    Regardless of the "stuff" (polite word replaced what was previously typed) associated with Social Security system, I'm tired of my SS check being called welfare.

    In today's society the word "welfare" signifies getting something for nothing. For 40+ years I was taxed with every paycheck for Social Security and Medicare. I did not have the choice to invest those dollars elsewhere.

    Investments that would have returned a higher yield, as was proved by the ROI for the monies that I was able to invest elsewhere. (Errors noted above do not change that fact.) Throughout my working years I was opposed to the SS system, wanting to have more self-determination with regards to my future. Now, that I have to partly rely on this system, I'm getting "welfare - something for nothing".

    During those times that I worked as a contractor, I paid both the employee and the employer rates. I paid the TAXES demanded by the government! Had to or would have suffered the consequences.

    I am, also, tired of being lumped in with the deadbeats and others who've learned how to play the system. I personally know a number of them who live in my area. :mad:

    This rant over. On to the next one.

    I went to the source of the report on savings.
    Emphasis added. I'll let the emphasis speak for itself regarding the poll.

    It's interesting that this wasn't presented from the positive standpoint. That 73% have personal savings. Also, put more emphasis that 33% of those reporting no savings are in the 18-33 age group. That includes students still in school and young families just getting started.

    I know that we were broke, or near to being broke, during our early years of marriage. I'm pretty sure that's normal for most young families. Generally, they have their lifetimes to build bank accounts and other resources for their retirement years. It is a dis-service to include them in headlines that say:

    Number of Americans Reporting No Personal or Retirement Savings Rises

    I noticed they don't show the change between the years by age group. Which group changed the most? Could it be that most of "rise" came with the 18-33 group? Could it be that the change for those over 33 would reflect a decline? Especially with the on-going uncertainty about the economy and the possibility of a double dip recession or worse.

    The purpose of this analysis:
    To continue creating more governmental "help the poor" programs a basis for a growing need has to be established and maintained. To continue to build the premise that government bears the responsibility, itself, rather than individuals being personally responsible for their lives from cradle to grave.

    Building the "entitled" society who will accept whatever the government demands, as long as they can feed at the public trough.

    For 40+ years the government took away some my personal accountability and responsibility via their SS taxation in order to try to make me more dependent on them. :BangHead:

    It's time for me to get off this sore spot and more to something more productive, something that will give glory to God, for the rest of this day. :godisgood:
     
  12. billwald

    billwald New Member

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    OT:Thanks for the reply.

    I know about and occasionaly practice lying with statistics. On the other hand, I believe reports that claim the number of old people living below the poverty line would double if not for their SS benefit. I personally know several old persons who would be in deep trouble if not for SS which is why I support the concept of SS even though I an not qualified and The Wife (only) gets the minimum amount.

    The other use of SS that FDR had in mind was that the SS money would go directly into the US Treasury and could be spent for relief programs - one example of why SS as an investment fund is pure fiction.

    I am a couple of years short of my 10 years of wages under SS. When Reagan had a law passed that prevented me from collecting 40% (?) of potential SS benefits I decided it wasn't worth the extra jobs to get qualified.

    I am unhappy the that the country stole my benefit but NOT unhappy that I paid in for 6 or whatever years. I was making minimum wage half that time and the total amount was not much. Why? Because it is a good program for everyone else and we are all in this, together.
     
  13. LadyEagle

    LadyEagle <b>Moderator</b> <img src =/israel.gif>

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    Oldtimer, I really liked your rant. I'm angry about the way Congress has stolen our SS money from us to pay for their wars and balance their budgets. It infuriates me when the jerks in Congress talk about SS like it is welfare, which it is not. I'm with you, OT.
     
  14. billwald

    billwald New Member

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    Why do you all keep beating up on yourselves and worrying about the wrong things? Read the SS legislation for yourself. The law REQUIRES that all SS funds in excess of cuttent needs be exchanged for Treasury bonds and the cash deposited in the Treasury. The SS Administration is the only one who still gets a hard copy of a Treasury note. Don't know about savings bonds.
     
  15. Oldtimer

    Oldtimer New Member

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    Bill, I've known for years that SS payments were NOT kept in a locked box. Know that the monies extracted under penality for non-compliance were not invested with the intent of securing/growing the "nest-egg" for future generations of old folks.

    Knowing what's behind the curtain doesn't change anything. As an American, law abiding citizen -- tax paying citizen -- working citizen -- voting citizen -- what other options did I have?

    BTW, I'm angry about the situation.

    I don't "worry" about it, as there's not much that I can do to change anything. If there's any worry, it's for my great nieces and nephews, if our Lord lets this continue through their lifetimes.
     
  16. LadyEagle

    LadyEagle <b>Moderator</b> <img src =/israel.gif>

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    And the Treasury Bonds are worth what???? Backed by what??? Fiat currency???
     
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