Why are some Ponzi Schemes more equal than others?

When the legal Ponzi Scheme was created in the 1930′s, the average life span was 63, but the benefits age was 65. Doesn’t it make sense to raise the retirement age, especially considering the fact that there are now far fewer payors than payees than there was when the program began?

Too bad all those right-wing Peterson-approved talking points were debunked ages ago:

Myth: Social Security is a victim of the aging baby boom, reflected in the ratio of workers to retirees, which used to be 16 to 1, is now 3 to 1, and in 2030, will be 2 to 1.

Reality: Today’s projected deficit has nothing to do with the size of the baby boom or worker to retiree ratios. The 16 to 1 ratio is a meaningless factoid, plucked from 1950, a year when Social Security was expanded to cover millions of new workers. The ratio never influenced policy in the slightest. It is the kind of ratio experienced by all pension plans, public and private at the start when few workers have yet qualified for benefits; the 2 to 1 ratio is meaningful and does translate into higher costs, but those costs were addressed decades ago. Congress has enacted ten significant Social Security bills since 1950. Every enactment has taken into account the baby boom, and each has left the program in long-run actuarial balance. The most recent enactment was in 1983, when the program was in balance through 2057 – the year the youngest boomers, those born in 1964, will turn 93. How social security went from a projected surplus through 2057, when most of the baby boom will be dead, to today’s projected deficit involves a number of factors, mainly related to changes in assumptions about wage growth, productivity and disability rates. The change from surplus to deficit is totally unrelated to the number of baby boomers, as one would surmise. After all, no new baby boomers have been born since 1983.

Myth: Social Security is going bankrupt.

Reality: From all federal programs, Social Security has been singled out for alarmist claims about bankruptcy because it operates under the conservative principles of a balanced budget and long-range projections. Bankruptcy is a meaningless concept when applied to the federal government or any of its programs. It is instructive to note that the bankruptcy language would disappear instantly if Congress simply reinstated the authorization, present in the law from 1943 to 1950, to pay any shortfall in Social Security out of general revenue. For more info, click here.

Myth: Social Security is unworkable in the face of an aging population

Reality: Eliminating Social Security’s projected deficit many decades away, is one of the easiest problems facing the nation. I propose a plan, which solves the deficit without benefit cuts, while raising extremely moderate taxes on just six percent of the workforce. Click here for more details. More fundamentally, our economy can support our elderly, the widespread demographic anxiety notwithstanding. One measure of the ability of a population to support its nonworkers is the total dependency ratio, which is simply the sum of those under age 20 plus those age 65 and over divided by those ages 20 to 64. The lower the ratio, the lighter the burden. The total dependency ratio in the United States was highest in 1965. It has declined substantially since then and is not projected to reach that level again until around 2078. Moreover, the composition of the dependency ratio has changed. There are now more elderly and fewer children in the mix. This is a positive development from the perspective of income support. Very few five year olds can support themselves; many 70 year olds can and do.

Myth: Social Security won’t be around when younger workers retire.

Reality: All the hype about bankruptcy has caused many to believe they are likely to receive no benefits from Social Security. Even if no change in Social Security is enacted for the next 75 years, future retirees will still receive higher benefits, in real dollar terms, than their parents who retire today. After all, for the next 75 years and beyond, Social Security will continue to collect billions of dollars in income week in and week out.

And from an excellent source, too, PW.

Nancy Altman’s book is a must-read.

This latest affront by DEM party “leadership” brings the clamor for primary challenges of bad democrats into sharper focus. It’s not the low hanging fruit of the Blue Dog type that should be primaried out of power but the party leadership that should be shown the door. That’s something that really could affect the future direction of the DEM party in a hopefully positive way. Current leadership in the DEM party is of the conservative/corporatist stripe and will only become more so as they are rewarded for their bad behavior by being repeatedly reelected. We shouldn’t waste our efforts on primaries for low ranking functionaries of the party elite that will change nothing but should focus on getting new leadership in place that will be receptive to it’s constituents. Old Italian saying: “The fish stinks from the head.” is quite right.

Well…I guess we need better democrats…who will always outwit and out think and out pressure their completely corrupt DLC leadership.

Ya came to the wrong place to spread that horseshit.

Are you on Clyburn’s or Pelosi’s staff?

And yet, in spite of all the significant info jane & team have shared, MANY (yes, MANY) Progressive visitors to this wonderful site WILL vote this Nov. to reelect their Dem. Incumbents seeking one more opportunity to fill their pockets and shaft Progressives.
To me this isn’t “tribal” behavior, it’s just plain nuts!

Poetic justice would be to have DeLay and Pelosi incarcerated in the same prison cell.

I wouldn’t worry about FDL. Worry about an ignorant and naive general public that are manipulated like marionettes if not out right dupes.

Ah, another soothsayer. Funny how they really never know what the fuck they’re talking about.

As this episode helps highlight, the rules of the House of “Representatives” (particularly those empowering the Speaker’s Dictating Committee, aka the House Rules Committee) are the ones in desperate need of reform.

The only way such reform is possible in such a locked-down institution, however, is if its members insist on it. Which means, by definition, bucking Party leadership. Something the pathetic ‘whippees’ of the Almighty Speaker and her minions seem utterly incapable of doing (or even entertaining as a possibility), publicly or privately.

All power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely. Of course Nancy Pelosi is Tom Delay in a skirt – even “benevolent” dictators are still dictators, and the dangerously-unbalanced, top-down control of the present House, enabled by lockstep Party caucus obedience to unexamined and undebatable leadership decrees, ensures that Speaker Pelosi will continue on her “we never lose” ways, with impunity. And that, absent reform, the next Speaker after Pelosi loses the throne will be sure to follow in her footsteps, just as Barack Obama has taken the path of least resistance by continuing so many of George W. Bush’s deplorable, yet mostly unchecked and unchallenged, practices.

There are Democrats on the House Rules Committee, chaired by Louise Slaughter, who rubberstamped the Speaker’s rule at issue here by mid-afternoon Thursday – every member of the House Democratic caucus knows who those members are, and could easily have contacted one of them to learn the details of the rule, before irresponsibly voting as power decreed, without first doing their homework or thinking for themselves. Cry me a river, Democrats… You’re either a member of the House, or a member of the Party, because in today’s world you apparently can’t be both the former and, to some lesser extent, the latter.

The most honest thing I ever recall hearing Alan Simpson say was in Alex Lawson’s on-camera interview in which he admitted that 1) the money in the SS “lock box” had been stolen by himself and other members of Congress and replaced by IOUs, and 2) they have NO intention of ever replacing the money they stole, so 3) Bwa ha ha ha ha!!!

I call ‘bullshit’ on Democratic congresspersons claiming that Pelosi tricked them. While that might be true, if a congressperson has not read or does not understand a piece of legislation before them, they should not vote for it. It’s become commonplace for democratic legislators (as well as many of their supporters) to blame someone else for their own behavior. Why enable them?

A brief word in support of catfood. It’s popularity is stealthily growing among various underground foodie groups and may well find it’s way to wide acceptance among boomers with aging palates in years to come.

Simple fix for all of Social Security’s woes: eliminate the cap on contributions. But oh no, we can’t have that. That makes rich people pay taxes.

I know that I have said this many times, but I just can’t help myself. pelosi grew up as a dim in Baltimore, but she married rich and now lives in SF. There is no way that she would be elected in SF as a repug. Since, however, she knows the dim language, she found it easy to stay with them. her class is the extremely well-to-do, so she is not now, and has not been for a long time, a friend of the middle class. Why the people of SF do not dump her, I think, is inertia. She embodies the corp outlook. As Jane said, tom delay in a skirt.

I was born in 1953. When I was in high school, they said Social Security was going bankrupt. Then they doubled the payroll tax so that my generation paid for the one before us and also paid into the trust fund for our own retirement.

If you want to erase the federal deficit, then do the following (1) Let Bush’s tax cuts for the rich expire; (2) Bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan; and (3) Get back the 8 million jobs lost in Bush’s Great Recession.

spoutingsh*t cites bogus AVERAGE life span data of 1930s vs today, which is mostly affected by improvements in childhood mortality rates. Life expectancy after reaching the age of 60 or 65 yr hasn’t increased nearly as much.

This is exactly why this government doesn’t work. They pass shit at the last minute rght before vacation, stuff nobody has read, is a couple thousand pages long, and they haven’t a fucking clue what they’re voting on. Or maybe they do. We need to try something different than this.

Wouldn’t means testing encourage people to hide money under the mattress, bury it in the back yard, and go to any length to not have shit in their name? Rich people have overseas accounts, but what of people with say $50,000.

I doubt Nancy Pelosi cares about wearing a skirt made of bullshit. It would take me the rest of my life just to count her fucking money. That’s all she’s interested in.

The Moral Depravity of both political parties seems to be at an all time high.

Has Nancy Pelosi been bribed to destroy our nation or is she just doing it for kicks? Peoples very lives are on the line with this and other economic issues.

Nancy needs to be kicked out of her leadership position if the rest of the Democrats want to make even weak claims to adequacy.

It is a matter of hierarchy, not idealism. If you go to kill the king or in Nancy’s case, the queen, you’d better kill them or they will kill you. Palace revolutions rarely succeed because few have the courage to stick their necks out and fewer have the courage to sign on to a new order. This should not come as a surprise. It is business as usual.

Great points. Pelosi was dishonest, and the Democrats were being lazy. It’s a great combination for shady politics.

I see the non-binding resolution to vote on the cat food commission’s recommendations very negatively. It seems unlikely that Pelosi would go to such lengths unless she intended to use the resolution as a justification for a vote on the recommendations.

Thanks Jane.

The Speaker took impeachment off the table.

No reason, she cannot take cutting Social Security off the table.

The problem is now, no one will trust her.

I have no problem with means testing, but I’m talking about the rich, assets over $2 million or salary above $200,000.

The decision of a state entity not to re-pay its bond debts is known as Sovereign Default, the most frightening phrase in the lexicon for bond traders. If states elect not to honor their debt, they can no longer enforce the laws that say anyone else must honor their own debt. So the entire planetary debt edifice collapses in a Jubilee.

Sovereign Default is what’s on offer from Simpson. Bond markets must be made to understand that if the USA will default on its seniors, we’ll default on anybody. And that, therefore, all debt is valueless.

Nothing — nothing! — scares them more. We’re talking single-digit DOW.

Can somebody who knows where it might be off the top of their head help me find the list of dems who voted for it?

I hate to say, “I told you so.”
But I did tell you so.
Nancy is bad news.

Go post that crap where the truth is not spoken.

How about raising the cap instead? Seems like the wealthy could better afford the haircut than the struggling middle and lower classes.

Sovereign Default is what’s on offer from Simpson. Bond markets must be made to understand that if the USA will default on its seniors, we’ll default on anybody. And that, therefore, all debt is valueless.

Egggszacktly. Because if Obama and the Dems follow Pete Peterson’s recommendations, we will be looking at Sovereign Default, probably after a nice big series of riots as what’s left of the middle and even upper-middle classes start making trebuchets from the timbers of the homes they can no longer afford.

Teddy, you are talking about how things should work. In this case all of the elite want this to happen so, rather that see it as a bad thing, they will see it as a good thing and the dow will go up.

Why should you mind, T? She’s enabling the GOP agenda, which you have upheld ever since you started commenting here. Some of us do have memories, you know.

Our government has spent money like a twelve year old with a credit card for about fifty years now. They spent it on wasteful wars and equally wasteful welfare programs. They have forgotten government can not do everything for the people. The people have to get off their dead butts and do for themselves. But of course now the people are conditioned to live on government welfare. Oh, I think you people refer to it as a safety net don’t you?

There is a 4th – Reverse NAFTA – and a 5th – Balance Trade

Oh, I think you people refer to it as a safety net don’t you?

Ah, the infamous “you people” rears its head. Senior citizens and the unemployed should get off their dead butts, because in some imaginary universe nobody needs support.

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Bankruptcy is a meaningless concept when applied to the federal government or any of its programs. It is instructive to note that the bankruptcy language would disappear instantly if Congress simply reinstated the authorization, present in the law from 1943 to 1950, to pay any shortfall in Social Security out of general revenue.

As a matter of constitutional law, the Secretary of Treasury would probably be required to pay Social Security out of general revenue in any event (14th Amendment, Section 5– “The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.”). Note that the Constitution defines “public debt” to include “payment of pensions”.

I didn’t know that SS was once funded out of general revenue. I do see that the years (1943-1950) were during the period (From 1942-1951) when the Federal Reserve capped short-term interest rates at 0.375% and long-term interest rates at 2.5% to allow Uncle Sam to fund World War II without sweating for 10 seconds what the “bond market” thought about the government’s enormous deficits— between 20% and 30% of GDP in 1943, 1944 and 1945. Thats equivalent today to $3 to $4 trillion annual deficits and yet no power on Earth (or Wall Street) could move long-term interest rates above 2.5%. But then our leaders then were smarter than the crew we have now.

To give another example, Warren Mosler recently dug up a 1945 speech to the American Bar Association by New York Fed Chairman Beardsley Ruml with the shocking but quite accurate title, “Taxes For Revenue Are Obsolete”.

The necessity for a government to tax in order to maintain both its independence and its solvency is true for state and local governments, but it is not true for a national government… Final freedom from the domestic money market exists for every sovereign national state where there exists an institution which functions in the manner of a modern central bank, and whose currency is not convertible into gold or into some other commodity.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/warren-mosler/taxes-for-revenue-are-obs_b_542134.html

In general, I think Pelosi has been a good Speaker. Comparisons with Delay ring hollow with me.

He likes to be condescending. Might not be so cocky if his investments are worthless this time next year.

Calling Nancy Pelosi Tom Delay in a skirt might work for bringing in fundraisers for this site, but it’s also the kind of name calling that sometimes gets commenters modded.
I see sometimes that people’s dander is So Up, they misread the true nature of a comment.
I’m starting to get worn out, weary and tired of reading comments calling other folks out for assuming, predicticting what a politician is definitely going to do and then turn around and do the same thing to some one else.
I’ve followed this blog for several years and what I’ve noticed is that when the pattern goes truly negative, with lots of name calling and generally negative in a personal way, that the number of comments decrease considerably. I think most people are good in their nature and get turned off by these comments.
And, before you tell me that I don’t care as much as you, because that’s one of the tactics used against criticism, I do care and that’s why I stuck my neck out with this comment.

Spoken like a true capitalist. We Wobblies see things differently.

In general, Pelosi thinks you’ve been a good commenter.

Are you advocating armed robbery and stealing? After 30 years of wealth redistribution from the working class to the wealthy, not much is left. Precisely where do ‘you people’ think ‘we people’ are supposed to find a damn job? THERE ARE NO JOBS!

Who knew it took a Grandma to make other Grannies eat catfood?

Yes, I believe in well regulated capitalism. And, I fully understand that many here see things differently than me. But, all progressives do not need to think alike.

We need to compromise on Social Security. I’m sorry, but when the social security program began, live expectancy was much lower than it is today. It makes sense to raise the retirement age given these circumstances. Democrats can reclaim the mantle of fiscal responsibility, given how much Reagan/Bush/ Bush jr. screwed us over financially. But we need to be intelligent. As for Pelosi/Reid/Obama… simply awful leadership. Americans as a society demand strong leadership from the president, even if that was not the intended role of the presidency. Obama needs to take charge and step on toes, though I’m quite certain he won’t be implementing policy I agree with.

Honey, cat food is not cheaper than people food. Leastways, the way I shop. But, if you want to spin, go right ahead.

I don’t want them to think alike. I’d like them to be able to see clearly, however.

These are the very people that can afford lawyers, accountants, and advisors to avoid paying taxes now. They are not about to have THEIR S.S. or anything else taken from them. Once again it will be the poor damn sap that has a couple bucks squirreled away that will pay, and be left penniless. Sorta like the healthcare scam. If you’re destitute you can qualify for Medicaid. If you have a couple bucks, you have to spend it to qualify. These blood-sucking bastards will stop at nothing until they have every last dime and we’re all beholden to them for our very existence.

I always appreciate your comments, demi, which is why I try to engage, albeit sometimes argumentatively. You make good points.

I like the song Draw The Circle Wide, draw it wider still. It’s about the power of diversity. I though this site was for discussion, not making a smaller circle, wherein if people don’t think exactly like you do, they’re wrong. Sorry to disagree with you, but I do.

I don’t believe I’ve ever witnessed well regulated capitalism. Exactly how does that work?

Thank you. You’re a Peach!

You said:

I have no problem with means testing, but I’m talking about the rich, assets over $2 million or salary above $200,000.

Problem is it won’t take them long to say assets over 200K$ and income over 20K$.

Also, once its means tested it will be painted as welfare and then it will be starved to death. Its what the Republicans have wanted to do all along.

Broken government — mired in gamesmanship.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html
The difference is small when you compare life expectancy of 60 year-olds. The retirement age has already been pushed to 67 – highest of any industrialized nation.

Raising the cap on earned income or even eliminating it and considering having passive income above a certain level taxed might afford an equitable solution.

Again I think this is a false argument. I am not talking about people with a few dollars squirreled away. I am talking about people with millions. I am talking about the upper 10% which has 2/3 of the nation’s wealth. There is no reason to needlessly confuse or fearmonger here. The distance between that upper 10% and us is vast.

Something many people in this country have forgotten but that I have retained are the names of Republicans who have wanted to destroy the New Deal from the day the programs were enacted.

Peter Peterson was one of the people at Camp David in 1971, along with John Connally, George Schultz, Paul Volcker, Caspar Weinberger, William Safire, and Herb Stein (Ben’s dad) when Nixon killed Bretton Woods.

From that point on, with exchange rates floating throughout the world, speculators have destroyed what used to be a well functioning worldwide monetary system.

Social Security and unemployment insurance are two of the last parts of the New Deal and oligarchs and their faithful pawns are chomping at the bit anxious to kill them off.

I think you might want to read my comment again, demi.

Don’t know what happened to the numbering???? Your comment is now 49.

Problem is it won’t take them long to say assets over 200K$ and income over 20K$.

That is total BS. Are you a libertarian by any chance because that is the kind of nonsense fearmongering argument they would use?

None of this life expectancy stuff makes any difference. With no changes whatsoever, Social Security is completely solvent until 2037, 25 YEARS from now. At which point, 25 years from now, payouts will drop to the level of pay ins, about 75% of where they should be.

I realize that you don’t want everyone to think alike. And, thank goodness, ’cause we’d all be so bored. I was referring to your thinking clearly line, and maybe was over-reacting to some other comments that were kind of bugging me.
The renumbering happens when a comment “disappears”, in my experience. *g*

I’m failing to see where in this thread anyone said anything untoward to you, demi. It seems to me you just don’t like some of what people say, whether it’s said to you or not.

I know the internet can be hard sometimes.

Snort. You make me smile.

I intensely hate all you Disaster Capitalists. You are greedy thieves stealing from us all and you fool no one.

Well, now we’re talking about what you think, and that’s all that matters.

: )

It is funny how just the idea of cutting social security makes the Dems run for the hills, because they know cutting social security is political suicide.

Nancy Pelosi is listening to Obama and Rahm, trying to do a little mis-direction. Nancy knows the plan, and the plan is to cut social security.

Nancy has to be in play, because Obama and Rahm are destroying Democratic house majority.

James Clyburn actions clearly show how congress is full of kabuki.

An extremely important point to make. We must take back the power of money. We must have a People’s Central Bank that does not have to borrow from the private Federal Reserve Banking system. Money created by law with proper restraints as to amount will not create inflation. Money would circulate in the U.S. and be used for human (SS, healthcare, and education) and physical infrastructure. We did it during the Revolution and in the Civil War.
Americn Monetary Act

We need monetary reform, not penny pinching. Pie-in-the-sky?

I totally agree with you!

Progressives need to target “progressives who represent strong progressive districts” the blue dogs are done, the tea party will swallow most of them up.

to save the DEM party we need to target people like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, and they just gave us the issue to do it on, “CUTTING SOCIAL SECURITY”

we need to make Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid defend the idea of “CUTTING SOCIAL SECURITY” this will end their political careers quickly.

Can we demand (ha ha) that before a penny of Social Security is taken away by raising the age to receive full benefits that all Congress people who have retired must also have their pensions cut? Why in a crisis do we attack retirees and the jobless? And can we start with Alan Simpson?

“Seeing” clearly is different from “thinking” clearly. I would like people to “see” things as they really are, not coloured by ideological lenses.

not coloured by ideological lenses.
Hoo, boy. I’m not sure if that’s possible. Fewer and less intense lenses may be the best we can hope for. As the Indians say, and I bet you know this one, it’ll be better next time (life).

Sadly, we don’t have regulated capitalism, we have a corporate oligarchy that bought and owns and controls our political process, and hence, our domestic and foreign policy.

All of which, are failing miserably.

Because of DEregulation.

I’m sure you know that, just had to say it out loud, once again.

Great post Mz. Hamsher, love the skirted Delay thingie . . . . PW, what a FINE catch and thanks for sharing that one.

Hugh and Teddy P once again with sanity and truth, ‘preciate that.

Demi, I see yer point, but calling Pelosi a skirted Delay is not name calling to the extent that if you or I had said that, we’d get modded . . . . . I’m working on scrollling the trolling, regardless WHO it is, old or new . . . ;-)

And I think yer the bees knees and always love reading your thoughts . . . .

Fucking Pelosi has always been a shill for everyone but the average American voter who leans a bit left or all the way out the driver’s side window.

She’s turning into Tom DeLay in a skirt.

Entirely accurate. Brain bleach please.

Oh geez. Nobody “tricked” anybody. Pelosi just gives them cover to continue raking in campaign contributions from their corporate masters while they strut around and pretend to be progressive so you guys will actually get out and vote. Honestly, I don’t see why this is either news or worth caring about. They’re all evil f*cking bastards who just want that 100K+ lifetime pension.

Larue – Dadoo – Love you – too!

I don’t believe you are looking at past life expectancy in the right context. Overall life expectancy has increased in this country because of the elimination of many childhood diseases and improvements in pre-natal care. However, the life expectancy after aged 65, really hasn’t increased much since the 50s. Please see this mortality table:
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html

Raising the SS age because people live longer is a very flawed argument. I would also like to point out that it is now said that those in the generations behind the boomers are not expected to live as long as we do because of sugar, salt in the diet causing obesity and diabetes. Many of them may never receive benefits. SS is a program funded by its own tax. It’s not general revenue. We need to force our legislators to stop looking at the SS payroll tax revenue as something they can access. Like someone else said, I’ve been hearing “SS is going to go broke” my entire adult life. It’s always 10 years from Now and it seems to always remain solvent. Let the Bush tax cuts expire, end the two wars, continue to stimulate the economy to get the jobs back and the debt will take care of itself.

I would like to propose calling it the “soup beans and cornbread commission” because catfood is too expensive for poor people to substitute for food.

Demi

You make some commendable points…but I gotta tell ya I have been riled up many a time recently over the kabuki play that stands for politics these days…and people have a ‘right’ to get more than mildly upset when you are discussing the impact these decisions have on us…not just as comments, but life and potential death issues.

As for patterns of negativity, I really believe that is nothing but an honest reflection of the current clusterfuck many of us are experiencing in real time on a daily basis.I know you profess the belief that most people are good in nature, but I disagree with you. There are lots of folks that are plain evil…no other way to describe it!

Peace

Damn, soup, beans and cornbread are already staples at my hooch.

The list of House members who voted for the Speaker’s rule (H.Res. 1500) at about 8 p.m. Thursday evening, and thus for the self-executing House Resolution 1493 with its Sense of the House language impacting Social Security’s future, is here. Other roll call votes that day and evening (including on the amendment that puts Congress on record as funding an escalation in Afghanistan without measurable objectives or defined purpose), in the order in which they unfolded, may be found in text and video here.

I would like to propose calling it the “soup beans and cornbread commission” because catfood is too expensive for poor people to substitute for food. - mocha @ 77

Actually, I think that the ‘selective/sovereign bond default’ description is particularly inspired. But the ‘catfood’ reference I associate with Kindly Old Ladies With Cats who are not about to abandon or starve their cats, come what may, and who will therefore actually feed their cats before they will feed themselves – to the extent of sharing the cat’s food, if desperate need be…

“She’s turning into Tom DeLay in a skirt.”

DeLay wasn’t Speaker. But the sagging analogy fits their cosmetic surgeries.

A real woman would never have done such a thing. Not ever.

Oh shoot, well, I was thinking cheap eats. I actually enjoy them myself.

But the ‘catfood’ reference I associate with Kindly Old Ladies With Cats who are not about to abandon or starve their cats, come what may, and who will therefore actually feed their cats before they will feed themselves

Now that is an interpretation I hadn’t considered. Fits nicely.

thomas.gov will give you that list, if you have the H.R. number.

In the context of the costs for Social Security, working with life expectancy is misleading. The question should not be, “How many years do we expect Joe or Jane to collect SSI after they turn 65?”. It should be, “How much do we expect it to cost, who will pay, and is there a reasonable way to estimate/measure this?” Consider, if the life-expectancy at ages 60 or 70 increased but far fewer people reached those ages, its possible that there would be no problem. Similarly, if the life-expectancy at ages 60 or 70 decreased slightly but far more people reached that age, there might still be a problem. The percentage of people for any given year who are old enough to collect SSI is a better proxy to reflect the burden than life expectancy, though they are related. Basically, if we knew the percentage of people who were over ages 60 or 70, we wouldn’t really care how long the average person expected to live at that point.

Fortunately, the same source you cited has this information as well:
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0110384.html

From this, the percentage who are old enough to collect SSI looks to have increased by roughly 50%.

FWIW, most of us have been paying in roughly twice as much as was needed for current pay outs in Social Security for the last 20 years precisely to build up a Social Security surplus to accommodate the bulge of people in the baby boom generation coming into retirement age now. Which accounts for a large portion of the 50% increase you mention.

Thank you very much, powwow!

THAT is the point! If the “smarter”, “more concerned”. “more involved” Progressive followers of Jane & tem will discard reason and vote to reelect “their” Dems, how can anyone expect the “tribe” to do differently?

Fits kindly old dudes with cats, too. *g*

Can you predict what I’ll have for breakfast tomorrow too?

No problem, if you tell me what you eat 90% of the time. :)))
(90% is about the reelection rate of incumbents if I recall correctly)

Could this be a feint? Get the R’s all whipped up about cutting & gutting SS, thinking the Dem leadership is onboard, then hang it on them before the elections. So far, it is the R’s with telegenic TV soundbites for cutting SS while Nancy and Obama chastise them for it.

Sure, this is eleventy-demensional chess thinking and time will tell but it could be a brilliant move to burn the R’s with their own electorate before November. Then, repudiate the commissions finding and move on. The real problem is I do not trust Obama or the Dem leadership so I am not hopeful of this strategy.

Agree with your solutions. If congress wants to make S.S. better then remove cap totally and make interesr rates floating to balance the payments to seniors.
Of the twin depression era achievements Glass Steagall Act & S.S. under attack in 1990s only S.S. came out unscathed. It proved its utility by preventing this recession to become another depression with our seniors providing vital & needed demand to our local economy. Since Glass Steagall Act is not reinstated yet except another boom followed by bust with S.S. acting to make sure its a recession unless it is gutted by tweaks such as mean testing which modifies it to a welfare concept from security.
S.S. as a concept is a progressive step in human history where everybody at a certain point in life irrespective of class or personal achievements or personal failures is taken care of by their next generation. This as a concept is unique and first in human history just like our national park concept and this S.S. concept needs to be still emulated by third world countries.
If there is no commerce which happens in depression then there will be no thriving chamber of commerce. So S.S. helps all Americans both Democrats & Republicans by preventing another depression. In my opinion it will be a better usage of congress time to work on progressive taxes reinstatement and work on export incentives to achieve trade parity than listen to this commission comments whose answer is to gut this unique well functioning concept which always seems to be in peril decade after decade but seems to work just fine when untouched.

“Nancy Pelosi threw the rule up for a vote and sneaked it by without telling even her own members what she was asking them to vote for.”

Blah blah blah. You are an elected representative, one of 400-odd, with oaths sworn and promises made. Do you “trust” somebody with Pelosi’s track record? Do you vote, sight unseen? No. If she dumps something in your lap at the last minute, you move to postpone, if that does not work you vote against.

These people are not victims, they are accessories.

Would challenges from the left have any chance of beating Pelosi and Hoyer, or is it already too late to do that?