Subnostr

Social Security (as originally envisioned) was essentially an individual retirement plan (i.e. you pay in each month, and over time accumulate enough savings to fund your retirement). It's no different (really) than our modern 401K plans.

Simple math is all it takes to determine the appropriate contribution amounts each month to provide a known retirement benefit at a given age.

As the years progress, that math can be adjusted to ensure all beneficiaries are fully funded (say in periods of high inflation, or low birth rate, when the math and the plan should be adjusted).

Again--it's just math.

What's happened is the US is that the program was a) mismanaged (i.e. bad math, with no / inappropriate adjustments over time) and b) political reallocation of the SS funds for other projects (which is the main reason we're in our current mess).

But the math is relatively simple--the program would just need to be properly managed (and good financial planners do this now every single day).

Just don't trust the government to do it--that's been the problem.

StackSats.IO 1y ago

The purpose of a system is what it does.

All this talk of what it could be, or should be, or was originally envisioned as is nonsense. It’s the kind of shit leftists tell themselves trying to justify their good intentions when their desired policies inevitably fuck things up and they want more intervention to fix their last round of mistakes.

If people want retirement money - save it yourselves. You don’t pay into a goddamn ponzi scheme reliant on perpetual currency debasement + population growth.

There is no need for a “system” for this, humanity survived Millenia without one and only started doing this shit in the late 1800s when Statism took off. There is no such thing as “properly managed” when it comes to Statism.

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Discussion

banjo 1y ago

Ah--now I agree with you!!

People SHOULD save it for themselves! That was the original point of Social Security - a recognition that people DON'T save, and then the government stepped in with a "solution".

And the solution *could* work--if set up and managed correctly (which is true)--yet (as with all things government) it was completely bollocksed up.

And at this point, it really is completely broken and quite likely irrecoverable (at least I can't envision a way to recover it).

(And it never really had to rely on population growth and currency debasement--that's just been the "excuse" given for the government mismanagement and theft of the SS treasury for othe projects)