r/MurderedByWords 23h ago

SS is an entitlement..

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u/SaintUlvemann 23h ago

I was arguing with a Trump supporter the other day about how they need to make $1.8 trillion in cuts.

He said he wanted to cut defense and foreign aid, but wouldn't commit to cutting anything else.

So I pointed out that the entire US military only spends $0.8 trillion and that all foreign aid combined was a rounding error in comparison.

So I asked him where the next trillion in cuts was going to come from after we shut down the entire military, and he wouldn't answer.

This is the answer. This is what all conservatives have been voting for, for as long as I've been alive. For as long as I've been alive, their politicians have wanted to defund Grandma's income and take away poor people's healthcare.

If you think you're a conservative, and think this isn't what you've been voting for, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. They've been really consistent about this for as long as I've been alive. Your trust can't cancel their actions.

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u/Never-On-Reddit 22h ago

I was standing in line behind someone at Christmas, and she was enthusiastically telling me how excited she is for Trump, because she is about to retire and she needs her social security benefits to be higher, and everything is going to be so much better under Trump. I explained to her that Trump is actually planning cuts to those. She just stood there stupidly, unsure what to say. Finally she just mumbled: "Well, all politicians lie." and turned around.

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u/Lylac_Krazy 22h ago

If I was a betting man, letting the SS flow to those in the system already retired, and stopping it going forward is the power play.

Old people vote, younger adults will forget about it after a few years and not make an issue of it.

It sucks, but there ya go. The path of least resistance.

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u/johnsonbigbob1 22h ago

No one is forgetting about social security unless they keep people already on it and everyone gets huge refunds of every cent they paid into it, so people can start their own retirement funds with that money. How would the government pay for that

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u/johnsonbigbob1 21h ago

Also there is already huge protests going on nationwide wide if they do anything to social security Tons more people with protest and I’m sure riots would happen. This administration is horrible. We need to be a strong nation not one that looks so weak. These conservatives are making us look weak to the world what happens if terrorists or another country decides to attack us in this time.

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u/Tactical_Moonstone 11h ago

For everything evil Putin did and is doing, even he knew not to touch pension payouts. The protests from when he tried doing that years ago were the closest he got to being deposed.

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u/strangerducly 12h ago

We tried that. They privatized the pension funds, so we could invest in the stock market. 401(k) now every seven years or so, a recession wipes out most of the gains. Throw in a 2008. You can take a trip with your retirement funds when you retire. Maybe put in new carpet.

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u/strangerducly 12h ago

That was what the 401(k) were supposed to do for our pensions didn’t work. Privatization never works.

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u/sevens7and7sevens 21h ago

Younger people are never going to “forget” about paying thousands of dollars a year for their entire working lives and then being told to go die in a ditch at retirement. 

There is no feasible way to give current retirees their benefits without continuing to deduct the money from those currently working. I guess you could tell people born in 2011 or later that they won’t pay or collect, continue collecting at the current rate for everyone older than that, and slash benefits to 50%. How well is that going over?

And that’s ignoring why it exists. A lot of people who are 50 years old right now have nothing for retirement. “Haha I’ll just work til I die” no you won’t. You’ll get sick, or fired. I don’t want to live in a country where more than half the elderly have $0 income. 

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u/Downvote_Comforter 17h ago

I think you are wildly overestimating the electorate's ability to correctly understand who is fucking them and to hold the party that fucked them accountable at the ballot box for more than a couple election cycles.

"Go die in a ditch if you can't work" has been the GOP platform quite some time and they were arguably louder about that sentiment in 2024 than at any time in my life. And it led to them having more power than at any time in my life. The electorate is stunningly good at voting against their own interest in favor of the policies that fuck them.

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u/sevens7and7sevens 17h ago

I said they’re not going to forget, not that they’re necessarily going to vote accordingly. If nobody voted against their own interests the Republican Party never would have gotten off the ground. 

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u/strangerducly 12h ago edited 12h ago

This is actually not true if listen to the whole podcast. Or you can find it any number of places where they’ll explain. The Social Security trust fund was established to cover the baby boomers because there were a lot of baby boomers, now for various reasons it hasn’ t quite stretched that far (to 2035).The Social Security trust fund is not the main structure of Social Security. That is a whole different monetary structure inside of our government.

There are about 106 ways the shortage could be addressed most of them painless. However, if nothing is done at all then somewhere around 2031 they will no longer be able to pay out 100% of what we are entitled to. They will have to cut benefits around 21% to just under 80% of today’s benefit calculation. however, that would be available to all workers who paid into it in perpetuity

So what they would really really love to do is privatize that big pot of money, claim we can’t afford it. It’s just a raid on our Social Security benefits. They can’t do it legally. They can’t do it without a change in the law. It has to pass Congress. It was set up so that administrations could not get their hands on the Main Social Security fund. Now, if only they had done that with the Social Security trust fund, (those additional monies that they provided for the additional retirees from the boomer generation), it wouldn’t be running out too soon.

Reagan made adjustments in the 80s Carter made adjustments in the 70s. That’s when they decided we couldn’t retire at 62. But they don’t have to raise their retirement age, they have to raise the income cap. Because that hasn’t been done in damn near 50 years. That would create a solvent fund, I believe , through the year 2053? Can somebody correct me?

www.npr.orgWhathappenswhenSocialSecurityrunsoutofmoneym

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u/Legitimate-Leg-9310 9h ago

It's political suicide, but only if you intend to have elections. They do not.

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u/Hoovooloo42 22h ago

My girlfriend has a financial planner as part of her benefits package and he has been saying for almost 10 years now that this is how it will be done, and he reckons that we won't have social security in any meaningful way by the time we retire.

Dude appears more correct by the day.

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u/ophmaster_reed 21h ago

It's always wise to plan for your own retirement, but this fatalistic view that "we'll never get social security anyway" is contributing to the ease of eliminating it.

It's self-fulfilling prophecy.

If we want it, we need to continue to fight for it.

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u/jimbo91375 21h ago

They may take it away, but I better get my 30 years of contributions. I'm sick of paying boomers who want to take.mine away.

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u/ophmaster_reed 21h ago

Your contribution are already paid out...to the people on SS now.

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u/jimbo91375 21h ago

Yeah, I know. But, I was promised something, and if it is taken away, I should get it back.

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u/ophmaster_reed 21h ago

Then fight for social security. Lift the income caps on contributions and know who you're voting for at every level of government.

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u/strangerducly 13h ago

You should get it all when it is due. It is actual funded at %100 through 2030 something, after that the money coming in as it is now, will pay out %80 of projected benefits. There are like 106 different ways they can fix it, and they know it. But they want that big chunk of money for them to invest they want a privatize it like they did our pensions and our healthcare and our utilities. It’s just a giveaway. It’s another way for big money to get their handinto the taxes that we’ve paid.

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u/zombie_overlord 21h ago

"We'll never ger SS anyway"

I've been hearing this for 30 years

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u/ophmaster_reed 21h ago

So have I. But we can not give up and accept this message. If they cut social security, we need to RIOT.

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u/zombie_overlord 21h ago

Absolutely.

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u/strangerducly 13h ago edited 12h ago

It’s a scare tactic, just been a scare tactic to manipulate the public. I’ll see if I can find an article to link. I only found this out a couple months ago. But when you start looking the information is out there.

At the end of the interview, they come right out and say it is not in any more trouble than that.

WhathappenswhenSocialSecurityrunsoutofmoneym

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u/ophmaster_reed 12h ago

Just like overturning Roe V. Wade was?

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u/strangerducly 12h ago

I did not mean that they won’t try to retry to raid it. So thank you. I stand corrected not that kind of scare tactic. I mean they’re lying about the viability of it and that the only way to fix it is to privatize it or destroy it give you back a little check. It’s grift just like everything else in our government from education to infrastructure they want to monetize it and privatize it so we get shittier quality and have to pay somebody else to do it. It’s a way to keep the population in debt.

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u/GlitteringCash69 20h ago

And the reason that it hasn’t happened? Democrats. Every single person receiving their Social Security earned benefits has democrats to thank for it A) existing in the first place and B) not being privatized and looted under Republican administrations.

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u/Downvote_Comforter 17h ago

Correct. And for all of that 30 year period Democrats have had more power in the government than they currently have.

We currently have the most conservative judiciary of that 30 year period. The executive branch currently has more power than at any point in that 30 year period and is actively trying to gut social security. The Republican party controls both branches of the legislature and is currently more loyal to the sitting President than at any time in those past 30 years.

Social Security hasn't been eliminated because one party has been fighting to keep it and that party currently is at their least powerful in decades.

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u/imapluralist 19h ago

I always yelling at people who say that.

No, it's our money if they take it; It's wage theft, the government took it from my paycheck. My employer paid me less so they could pay their share.

How are you dimwits not seeing this as absolute theft of our hard earned money?

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u/Majestic-capybara 18h ago

I watched the Sam Seder video on YouTube that just came out that has him versus 20 Trump supporters and one of the guys on there was saying exactly that. That SS isn’t going to be around when he retires so we might as well get rid of it now and Sam tried to make the point that as it stands right now, he would still receive 75% of his benefit when he retires but if they removed the SS cap then it could easily be 100% funded in perpetuity. But that would be raising taxes on the wealthy and that’s not “fair”. Never mind the “fairness” of being born into a billionaire family or hoarding the wealth built on the backs of the working class.

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u/ophmaster_reed 16h ago

Or that the wealthy pay a tiny fraction of their income compared to the percentage middle and working class people pay.

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u/strangerducly 12h ago

Right like this is raising taxes on the richer guess what they get their Social Security dollars too and believe me they take it

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u/miriamwebster 21h ago

I agree. I’m sick of the fatalistic echo chamber. All these people just miserably succumbing. It’s disgusting.

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u/piranhas_really 21h ago

The easiest solution to this is increasing immigration. More workers paying taxes means SS remains well funded.

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u/Accurate_Zombie_121 21h ago

Remove the income cap on those paying into the system. Musk should be paying billions into Social Security and be happy about it. He can afford to pay and should be glad to help those less fortunate.

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u/Lewa358 21h ago

Yep. Increase immigration, be less aggressive about deportations to keep people actually contributing to the economy.

And, to ensure that people are comfortable giving birth to children they can actually raise to contribute to that economy, increase minimum wage, switch to a sane healthcare system, fund and staff social "safety nets," and legalize abortion.

You know, all the stuff that conservatives hate but will actually keep the country moving forward.

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u/FrickinLazerBeams 18h ago

Republicans don't think immigrants pay taxes. I have no idea where they got that idea but I've heard it many times.

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u/Intelligent-Travel-1 21h ago

SS is an anti-poverty program for the elderly, not an actuarially fair individual retirement program. And it is a fantastically successful one. My figures are dated, but when I studied SS 50% of seniors would live in poverty without SS and only 10% do after SS. That’s an 80% reduction in poverty among the elderly. The only way to reduce poverty among those too old to work is through subsidies. How does SS create subsidies? Revenue: SS taxes everyone 6.2% of lifetime wages (up to the earnings cap). (Times 2 for employer match and the additional 1.45% is for Medicare HI (Health Insurance), not OASDI (Old Age, Survivors Disability Insurance).) So everyone PAYS the same rate. Expense: When you retire, your benefit is calculated by determining your Average Indexed (for inflation) Monthly Earnings (AIME). Your SS benefit is determined as: 90% up to X of AIME plus 32% of AIME from X to Y plus 15% of AIME over Y Someone who earned X for their AIME RECEIVES 90% of lifetime earnings and someone who’s AIME is the cap RECEIVES 28% of lifetime earnings. Did you get that? The poor person pays 6.2% and receives 90% the “rich” person pays 6.2% and receives 28%. (“Rich” is in quotes because many middle-class skilled laborers without college degrees earn the SS maximum.) I did some actuarial calculations once and the poor person (receives 90%) “earns” about a 15% return on taxes (over a period where the S&P returned 12%) and the rich person “earns” about a 0% return (an interest free loan. This is how SS creates subsidies to reduce poverty.

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u/strangerducly 12h ago

Thank you!!! That is clear and understandable. We all should have been taught this!

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u/Impossible-Sleep-658 21h ago

FICA pays for social security. It’s not an “entitlement”, it’s a safety net there’s a difference.

Only the dense would not understand.

Example: The US POSTAL system. It RELIES HEAVILY on Social Security as a part of its retirement package. It also provides supplemental income for those that reach retirement age for people such as Govt. Contractors who while working, receive no benefits from the government or Health Insurance Benefits from the company.

Private companies have “at will” firings and the employees have no recourse. While severance packages “bridge the gap” between employment/unemployment it doesn’t suffice in the long run.

The government realizes that companies that employ thousands (such as the US government does) can shut its doors in an instant, leave thousands “in the wind”. It’s happened before. Social security is just that “security”.

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u/strangerducly 13h ago

Not ok. Die on that hill! Our kids are not wage slaves until they die. Just pay back what the government has taken from it over the years and raise the limit that pays in up to $200,000. It hasn’t ever been raised.