john9001: <>>
thats funny, the bank keeps cashing my SS checks. boy are they stupid. I have an opinion who is stupid here and it's not "they" but rather some people who have no idea where their checks are coming from and what their retirements obligations are backed with.
They are cashing your checks - not from the Social Security Trust Fund but from incoming payroll taxes.
Head of the General Accounting Office comptroller General of the United States Dawid M. Walker's speech on September 17, 2003.
http://www.gao.gov/cghome/npc917.pdf Importantly, while we are starting off in a financial hole we don’t really have a very good picture of how deep it is. Specifically, there are a number of very significant items that are not currently included as liabilities in the federal government’s financial statements; for example, several trillion dollars ... in so-called “Trust Funds.” In the case of the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds, the federal government took in taxpayer money, spent it on other items and replaced it with an IOU[/b]. Given this fact, why aren’t the amounts attributed to such activities shown as a “liability” of the U.S. Government? ... The current U.S government liability figures also do not adequately consider veterans’ health care benefit costs provided through the Department of Veteran’s Affairs nor do they include the difference between future promised and funded benefits in connection with the Social Security and Medicare programs. These additional amounts total tens of trillions of dollars in discounted present value terms.
... In less than 10 years, due primarily to the retirement of the baby boom generation, the United States will be hit by a huge demographic tidal wave that is not expected to ever recede! This is unprecedented in the history of our nation.
There is no money there, only bonds. Right now payrol taxes paid by the workers cover the payouts but in a few years when baby-boomers start retiring the inflow will not be enough and the government will have to redeem those IOUs. In order to do that it will have to raise taxes, reduce benefits or print money.
miko
