Dear Washington D. C.:

America here again. Let’s talk Social Security.

And let’s be frank about it. The Social Security program is a much needed program to help seniors who can no longer work to help themselves.

There are a number of reasons these seniors can no longer work. Probably the most contentious and least obvious is that employers do not want to hire older workers. Then, of course, there’s the fact that many are physically or mentally unable to work. With fewer and fewer jobs available in the United States, it’s not unreasonable for older workers to move out of the work force and allow younger ones to move in.

What About Privitization?

This is probably the silliest idea that has ever come along. Younger workers already have the means to open individual retirement accounts and participate in 401K accounts. These have not always been available to those who are already retired or those nearing retirement age. And, those who did try to supplement Social Security with smallish privitized retirement accounts saw those accounts tank in the last few years. Throw in 8,000,000 job losses and a bursting housing bubble and many people had to cash in those retirement accounts to pay mortgages and living costs.

Saving for a rainy day is pretty damn stupid when there’s a hurricane in your back yard. It’s time to act. It’s time to protect yourself and your family, and that’s what a lot of people did. IRAs and 401Ks flooded Wall Street with new money. You, my Washington friends, deregulated those folks and allowed them to create derivatives – essentially a piece of paper with writing on it. And those wise folks began selling worthless paper to one another. It was sort of a "I’ll buy yours if you’ll buy mine" sort of thing. In their wisdom, they tied the worthless paper to worthless mortgages, also a product of your creative legislating.

And now you’re thinking about taking the security out of Social Security and giving it to Wall Street? How #@^&*%$ stupid do you think we are? Okay, good point. We did elect the fools who did this to us. But that era is over.

Raising the Retirement Age

Okay, if you will stop talking about privitization, I’ll talk to you about raising the retirement age. Go ahead and raise it to 70 for people currently under age 50. This will give those younger folks who probably already have other retirement accounts plenty of time to make any necessary changes to their retirement strategies – and it won’t mess with the folks who don’t have time to make any changes.

The Need for Social Security

Long ago we moved away from the agrarian society in which each family took care of itself. You talk about the federal deficit putting a burden on future generations of our children, but don’t put a lot of thought into dropping the aging generation directly onto the backs of their children. Again, we no longer live in that world.

Social Security, modest though it may be, still allows a person to have a little bit of respect. In many cases, a large portion of the Social Security check is paid to Medicare for health insurance. And, in some instances, the Social Security recipient qualifies for Medicaid to pay the coinsurance portion of Medicare.

We are not a society who casts the elderly aside. Families cannot fill the gap. Churches cannot fill the gap. Meals-on-Wheels cannot feed everyone every meal.

Yes, everyone gets a kick out of calling these Entitlement Programs. The connotation is that people feel they’re entitled to these benefits. Well, they are! Because they are American citizens. We are supposed to have a government of the people, by the people and for the people. We are supposed to have a government that provides for the common welfare of its citizens. Those aren’t my words. They were written by our Founding Fathers.

One last thing. You’re really not thinking about giving a tax break to the wealthiest 2% of Americans and take the money away from the elderly – are you? I mean, really, are you?

Franklin Roosevelt said it this way:

What Others Are Saying:

"Social Security is not in need of saving. It is the most fiscally responsible part of the entire federal budget. Its benefits are modest, averaging less than the minimum wage. It is extremely efficient, returning in benefits more than 99 cents of every dollar spent. At its most expensive, when the Baby Boom generation is fully retired, Social Security will cost half as much, in terms of percentage of GDP, that France, Germany and many other countries are paying for their counterpart programs right now, today. Its projected deficit, still decades away, is manageable in size – just 0.7 percent of GDP, about the same amount as extending the Bush tax cuts for the top two percent of Americans." – Nancy Altman on Huffington Post

"Social Security benefits play a vital role in reducing poverty. Without Social Security, according to the latest available Census data (for 2008), 19.8 million more Americans would be poor. Although most of those kept out of poverty by Social Security are elderly, nearly a third are under age 65, including 1.1 million children." – Paul N. Van de Water and Arloc Sherman

More Independent’s Day Articles

Independent’s Day
Independent’s Day – Social Security (this article)

FYI – here’s information you can use.

Online Little Rock.com is where Uncle Brice got his start. There’s a ton of information on this site about Arkansas, Little Rock, dining, dancing, shopping (and shopping online). It’s also a high-trafficked Civil War information site. You can even find out stuff about all the colleges and universities of Arkansas.

Home Business Opportunities is a site that has never been more in demand. You can find legitimate ways to earn money from home as well as a lot of information about Internet marketing, writing, building traffic for your website, and more.

The owners of Online Little Rock have a mission in life to teach everyone about brain injury. They have two websites that have hundreds of pages of information, including visitor-submitted Brain Injury Stories. The sites are Brain Injury Online and Brain Injury Guide.

Beth’s Brain Injury Blog is a favorite in the brain injury community. She writes about the good, the bad and the ugly of brain injury and how you must maintain a sense of humor to live successfully whether you are the victim or a caregiver.

Washington, Wonkheads and Willy-Nilly politicians simply don’t get it. Americans are tired of do-nothing political parties. The Democratic Party and the Republican Party have failed to produce a government of the people, by the people and, especially, FOR THE PEOPLE.

The latest example: Americans are tired of deficits. We tried it using credit cards and got our ass burned by big banks. Now, we don’t really appreciate Washingtonians running around building higher and higher deficits by spending money we don’t have or cutting taxes for the richest among us.

Republican Jon Kyl and Democrat (DINO) Blanche Lincoln want to cut about $250 million in estate taxes for the richest Americans. This is $250 million more than what was done during the Bush Years. Now is not the time to cut these taxes.

It’s Time to Pay the Bills

We know that America has long had a deficit that must be paid sometime. We know that the Clinton Administration left office with a budget surplus (taking in more than was being spent). We know the Bush Administration ran wild by cutting taxes and spending billions of unfunded dollars. (continued below)

An unfunded dollar is like using a credit card when you don’t have the money and really don’t know how you’re going to pay the bill when it comes due. Perhaps it’s time to do something none of us really wants to do – Pay the Bill. It will help when the tax cut for the rich comes to an end later this year, but we don’t need Senators Kyl and Lincoln giving them another cut.

People quickly talk about cutting Social Security and Medicare. It would not be morally right to do that with so many people having made plans based on those programs being available. More importantly, there are a great number of people who have been forced into factoring those programs into their future because of personal tragedies in the financial industry.

As bad as it hurts our feelings, Congress needs to increase the Medicare withholding tax by at least one percent (1%). While they’re at it, they need to increase the FICA tax by one percent (1%) as well. For those of you making $500 per week, those taxes would cost you $10. Ten bucks to help stabilize Social Security and Medicare is not a bad deal, and it would reduce the burden on our children in the future.

It’s Time to Pay for the Unfunded War

Yes, it’s important to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to stem the flow of dollars, but we need to pay for what has already been spent. Let’s increase the severance tax on oil being taken from our reserves by corporations not incorporated in the United States. This would include all three of the ones involved in the Gulf Oil Spill: BP, Halliburton and Transocean. Oh, you thought only American companies were drilling in the Gulf?

Part Two of this would be termination of Halliburton contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan. They can’t, or won’t, tell us where the money is going, so stop giving it to them!!!

It’s time to end the tax benefits for companies sending American jobs overseas. This should be a no-brainer. After all, why is the government subsidizing the reduction of our tax base? Let me put this a bit more plainly. We are currently spending money to lower our income. Is there a school in America that teaches the value of increased expenses and reduced income? Those of you who are Capitalism Hawks ought to be jumping on this with both feet.

Hey Washington -

We’re tired of listening to you blame one another for getting nothing done. Either get it done, or come home. Oh, wait a minute – we’re going to take care of that for you, I hope. I took part in early voting the other day and, though I really did not plan it this way, I walked away not having voted for a single incumbent.

I do not belong to the Tea Party movement. I’m just a pissed off American citizen.

Uncle Brice Supporters

Say Hey to the Good Folks that make this blog possible:

Online Little Rock.com is where Uncle Brice got his start. There’s a ton of information on this site about Arkansas, Little Rock, dining, dancing, shopping (and shopping online). It’s also a high-trafficked Civil War information site. You can even find out stuff about all the colleges and universities of Arkansas.

Home Business Opportunities is a site that has never been more in demand. You can find legitimate ways to earn money from home as well as a lot of information about Internet marketing, writing, building traffic for your website, and more.

The owners of Online Little Rock have a mission in life to teach everyone about brain injury. They have two websites that have hundreds of pages of information, including visitor-submitted Brain Injury Stories. The sites are Brain Injury Online and Brain Injury Guide.

Beth’s Brain Injury Blog is a favorite in the brain injury community. She writes about the good, the bad and the ugly of brain injury and how you must maintain a sense of humor to live successfully whether you are the victim or a caregiver.