USA Today asks, can Tiger Woods Save Social Security?
Here's a relevant quote:
"Taxing all income and capping benefits would fix Social Security - mathematically, at least. The program would run a permanent surplus if all income - including the millions earned by athletes, movie stars and corporate tycoons - were subject to the 12.4% Social Security tax and if benefits for the affluent were capped at current levels, according to the Social Security Administration."
UPDATE: Here's another informative article on raising the cap.
Here's a relevant quote:
"Taxing all income and capping benefits would fix Social Security - mathematically, at least. The program would run a permanent surplus if all income - including the millions earned by athletes, movie stars and corporate tycoons - were subject to the 12.4% Social Security tax and if benefits for the affluent were capped at current levels, according to the Social Security Administration."
UPDATE: Here's another informative article on raising the cap.
posted by Hans Riemer at 11:37 AM
19 Comments:
If you really want to empower young people and enlighten them on Social Security? Let them see it for what it really is!...Social Security is nothing more and nothing less than a Gov. ran retirement plan! You will pay in more money and get back less! If you really believe that paying in more and recieving less is what you want from your hard earned money, more power to you! If you want to be able to choose a better retirement plan for the money you earn, I say why not? WILLisms.com has very interesting graphs and facts about Social Security Reform!
So what your saying is if you work hard your whole life and still don't have enough to retire on then oh well to bad keep working till ya die right? I believe we need to work together Social Security is what most people with a larger means use as a backup. There is a need for social security reform but there is no need to tear down the whole system.
So let me see, we just tax the wealthy on every dime they make but don't give them any of the increased benefits, in fact we'll just make sure that when they retire they get the 2004 benefit scale instead of whatever current SS benefits are available? Yeah great idea. So tell me, while Tiger can conceivably play his non-contact sport for another 30 years what do you do with the football star who had his millions taxed an additional 12.4% and is now in his 60's with practically nothing due to medical costs or poor spending? Do we then up the cap for them because we feel sorry? What happens to the businessman who runs the local cleaners if in ten years his business goes under? Does he get to recoup his lost benefits over the ten years his business income was taxed an additional 12.4%?
I swear, if most Americans actually understood how small to medium business worked ideas like this would be laughed at for what they are: ridiculous. I can't imagine how the additional 12.4% tax on small and medium businesses would hurt the economy... oh and I can hear erik cry now, "we're talking about personal income not taxing corporations", yeah I know but what most people don't realize is many small to medium business owners file their company's income as their own, meaning its subject to SS taxes... so think twice about how your job might be affected before espousing the soak the rich campaign, because Tiger's multi-millions is the upper echelon of wealth in America while the majority of small and medium business owners (most of our bosses) make up the lower tier and as I've mentioned before the only way a business man can offset the added overhead of more taxes is through raising the cost of goods and services or cutting back on employment and salaries.
It wouldn't be tearing down the whole system! We still would have Social Security for disabled, handicapped and anyone else who chooses! If you work hard all your life and invest in Social Sec. you are guaranteed to pay in more and get back less! ... The Presidents plan looks very promising! I don't understand what you disapprove of! It is very pro american! Everyone who chooses would benefit!... What part of pay more and get less sounds good to you?
Alright Reimer.
Let's tax all income for 12.4%. Then, watch what happens when everyone who makes more than $90,000 ends up paying significantly more in taxes, but does not end up with a single dime in increased benefits to match what they're paying.
What does that sound like? A welfare program. What's most humorous about that is your very own Democratic Party hates progressive indexing because people will realize the truth of the program- that it's nothing more than a giant welfare-redistribution scam, and thus they oppose index changing so people don't realize it.
Your giant tax hike would do the very same thing. You seriously must not be a deep thinker if this is all you can propose- in fact, I've read your "work" in the past, and all you ever propose is this giant tax hike. The funny part is that it'll be whiners like you that lose their jobs first because of such tax hikes in the first place.
Go to France. That nation's social spending schemes would suit you much better.
So what do we do about all of the people that will lose their jobs because the business owners have to pay more in taxes? The business owners will hire fewer people so that they can maintain their style of living.
Prices of everything would go up, too- particularly for entertainment and sports, because those industries dish out the biggest salaries. Let's think about this from a sports point of view. Now, Hans looks like a huge nerd, so he probably has no idea how the sports world operates, so this is for the rest of you.
Let's say we have a Peyton Manning, making $40 million off his contract. All of a sudden, he now has to pay an additional 12.4% tax on all of his income. Now, what do you think he's going to do? Sit there and just take the tax? Hell no. He's going to demand that the owner of his football team and the general manager pay him 12.4% higher in salary, so he can compensate for it.
What happens? Teams start dishing out money, income shrinks across the league, the salary caps don't grow as much as they should, and teams end up having to jack up the prices of tickets and products everywhere.
Then we'll all have to pay higher prices. You can apply this same thing to anything else, such as movie tickets or the cost of CDs/DVDs.
Hans's "tax the rich" strategy is typical of liberal Democrats- and reality will slap them in the face should they implement it, another typical occurrence.
Pathetic. Everyone on the left and Right trashes the uncapped SS and capped benefits in the article!. That proposal is hammered by everyone from Dean Baker and EPI to public economists to Heritage.
And that's the quote that Hans chooses to highlight. That's just embarassing. It's a non-starter idea, that NO ONE will support. Raises taxes well over 50% for folks and then turn SS into a complete welfare program!
How frigging stupid. If anything, it just shows 1) how deep the SS hole is and 2) How wacked out is Hans. Hans is saying that the key quote is the one idea that everyone pounded. Everyone.
I'm beginning to think that Hans isn't real. There's no way someone can be so dumb as to actively and vehemently support a policy initiative that ALL sides totally oppose.
Very few people would support getting rid of the cap entirely. I don't.
We do suggest raising the wage base back to covering 90% of national wages, as the program was originally designed. That would set the Social Security tax at about $150,000 today. I'd do it slowly, over a period of several decades.
That would add a lot of money to the fund.
The way the tax is structured now, its basically a loophole so big that Bill Gates' entire income can pass through.
So basically, Hans, you'd take a regressive tax and continue its regressivity, placing a giant tax hike on the upper middle class instead of the super rich?
That plan reeks even worse than the one you advocated in your main post today. If you're going to tax anyone, tax the super rich, not the rest of the middle class. You tax up to 150k and all you're doing is reducing the incentive of people to make more than 90k, plus you're damaging the middle class even more than it already is.
The ONLY tax hike proposal that makes any sense is Lindsey Graham's "donut tax" proposal, where income below 90k and above 300k or so would be taxed, leaving a giant hole for the upper middle class, protecting small business owners and giving people an incentive to grow their wealth.
Increasing the wage cap up to 150k does little to solve the problem, especially if you plan to do it slowly like you propose. Progressive indexing, on the other hand, solves 70% of the problem, and only realistically cuts benefits for the upper class and those who make more money. And the PRAs allow for those who want to try for a bigger return to choose to do so.
If you're going to raise the payroll tax cap, either do the donut tax or do nothing. Small business owners and the upper middle class- who already pay a pretty high taxation rate- don't need an additional burden placed upon them.
Who can really argue against letting people have a choice in the matter?
Just let people have a choice, Hans.
If you really want to tax the rich, impliment a consumption tax. Most of the Super rich can adjust their wealth to where they hardly show an income coming in, meaning they don't pay much in income taxes. Not to mention how many of the ultra rich are retired earning no income. If we had a consumption tax, the problem would be eliminated. Every dollar the ultrarich spends will be taxed. Every car they buy, every yacht they purchase, etc.
You have it ass backwards, Hans. Tax the middle class even more. Yippee. I knew I read this blog for humor.
I am saying Social Security needs reform ASAP!...President Bush has a great plan! It will benefit everyone and still continue for disabled persons and anyone else who chooses to continue with Soc.Sec! ...Today WILLisms.com will have REFORM THURSDAY. It is every Thursday. It is very informative. Reform Thursday is usually filled with interesting facts and graphs! Log on to WILLisms.com Blog later today and it will inform you on both sides of the issue!
I actually like Lindsey Graham's "donut hole" plan, too. I'm still noodling on it but in a way I like it even more than my own proposal of raising the cap after 90K. So, I'm thinking about it.
So what your saying is if you work hard your whole life and still don't have enough to retire on then oh well to bad keep working till ya die right? I believe we need to work together...
I wouldn't mind helping these people out in my own time and my own way. I appreciate your concern for this group of people, but it doesn't justify threating others with possible prison rape for non-compliance to support your charity.
I actually like Lindsey Graham's "donut hole" plan, too. I'm still noodling on it but in a way I like it even more than my own proposal of raising the cap after 90K. So, I'm thinking about it.
Finally, some common ground. Now if you could get over your partisanship (like I just did by advocating the donut tax), and actually supported giving the youth of America the CHOICE to invest in PRAs, we'd have a nice compromise on our hands.
The donut tax should raise enough revenue to make up for any cost of PRAs, and then PRAs would pay for themselves for those who take them. It would lead us down the path to solvency, and if we still had a gap, we could price index benefits for those who are in the upper class- perhaps those who make more than $90k.
There's room for compromise here, but only if people like you stop ruling out entire sets of options. You seem to despise PRAs, just like Democrats do. Meanwhile, I'm a fairly anti-tax person yet I just advocated the "donut tax." I'm willing to compromise here, and I'm sure the President is too.
Too bad the other side doesn't see it that way.
"from each according, to their ability to each according to their need"
In a perfect scenario this would result in a Utopia. I will admit, it sounds nice, but it has been tried many times, and it always fails.
Why are so many of us "young people" so naive? Why do we speak before we know what we are talking about? Please people do some research! "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. " --George Santayana
So the solution is tax more and then give more? I find that to be one of the worst ideas put forth yet. You can't sustain a system where the number of those drawing benefits slowly draws even with those paying benefits. Especially if you want to give these people more than they contributed while in the work force.
The only solution is to allow each person to keep their money invested for their own retirement and not continue this giant wealth redistribution.
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