“Wisconsin’s Democratic state senators went into hiding to deprive the Republican majority of the quorum they need to pass Walker’s agenda. The Senate majority leader, Scott Fitzgerald — who happens to be the brother of the Assembly speaker, Jeff Fitzgerald — believes the governor is absolutely right about the need for draconian measures to cut spending in this crisis. So he’s been sending state troopers out to look for the missing Democrats.
The troopers are under the direction of the new chief of the state patrol, Stephen Fitzgerald. He is the 68-year-old father of Jeff and Scott and was appointed to the $105,678 post this month by Governor Walker.”
Good to know there is some kind of collective bargaining going on.
As a sign of the level of ignorance that pervades the media Bill Maher, a professed liberal/progressive, presented a major amount of misinformation regarding Social Security and the budget deficit. The first sign that ignorance was about to be the basis of the discussion was the absence of any panel members with any significant knowledge of the issue. Bill presented Social Security, Medicare/medicaid and the military as co=equal contributors to the deficit. There was no reference at all to FICA as an independent and dedicated funding stream for benefits. Nor was there any reference to the Trust Fund as the source of benefit supplementation in the event of a FICA deficiency. All in all it was a totally information free zone at the desk of Mr Maher. This from a program host who prides himself as being a knowledgeable supporter of a liberal/progressive ideology. That is truly troublesome.
Maher had a brief tete a tete with Tavis Smiley over Bill’s ill chosen remarks about Muslim/Arab men and their attitudes towards women. Those remarks being set off by the nasty incident suffered by Lara Logan in Egypt. Tavis tried to point out that branding an entire culture by the actions of a group from that culture was irresponsible. He went a step further and suggested that there is a large sector of American men who do not hold very good attitudes themselves. Again, the distinction in this argument being that Maher generally holds himself out to be well informed and intelligent on social issues. All in all both discussions cold have been led by Ann Coulter rather than Bill to the same effect. It was an extremely dismal night for intelligent discussion on a widely syndicated TV program.
Observe Table 8-8 of the 2012 US budget presented to the world and inside the beltway on 14 Feb 2011, right on time which is much better than the entire pentagon could do on an airplane of ship.
All figures in $2005 constant dollsrs so you can price a tank in real $ not %
1969: $519B (US entangled in Southeast, Northeast Asia and Western Europe)
1979: $314B (Jimmy Carter applying Adm Rickover management policies to the war machine)
1989: $482B (Star Wars and filling the war profiteers’ trough)
1999: $348B (Cold War peace dividend minimized by unwarranted influence)
2010 $608B (overflowing trough for war profiteers and foreign dictators’)
In 2012 budget the war machine gets 19.9% of outlays.
Three times what the UK MoD gets and 5 or 6 times what the Bundeswehr comsumes.
Too much war profiteering going on at the expense of better uses of the money.
This (mine, here) is an irresponsible observation:
I had not known that Carter trimmed the defense budget. I did read recently that the Neocons arose in response to NIxon’s efforts at détente with the USSR. Not to get all paranoid about it (no lizard beings from outer space in my philosophy) but it does seem as if presidents who cut defense spending run into all sorts of problems. Just goes to show, I guess, that if they aren’t smart about defense, they just aren’t smart enough to govern.
GHW Bush not only got on the wrong side of the neo cons for raising taxes he was more like Jimmy Carter than he gets credit for. His cuts to DoD were continued by Clinton, and the industry was livid at GHW Bush in 1991 for allowing Cheney to kill the A-12.
Note the US Navy is still floating 11 carriers even without the A-12.
Carter did some good things, zero based budgeting keeping the B-1 in test, building F-16’s and A 10’s, but cutting back and limiting procurements to things that work.
The uselessness of the US military in the face of the Arab oil embargo, helped the folks recognized the war machine was not all it was cracked up to be.
Thus Carter is villified, wrongly to imply St Ronald kept the Red horde away by enriching the war machine and voodoo economics.
Related to the topic of budget cutting. Has anyone noticed that Cameron in the UK is going against local council managers who make more than he does (he is the Prime Minister). They are publishing a list. Why don’t the governors add this to the mix, propose that no state employee make more than the governor? Given what happened in Bell Ca, (all be it that is a runaway train of a case), one suspects that state and locals perhaps pay more than need be for managers, as well as for professional services. Its clear they pay far to much for investment banking services for example. If we are going to cut lets cut these services also.
For whatever good it might do I sent the emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom. Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise! I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $$12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html ****** Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
For whatever good it might do I sent the emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom. Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise! I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html ****** Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
For whatever good it might do I emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom. Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise! I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html ****** Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
I can hear the howling from here. I agree that managers are overpaid and there are too many of them. But they will tell you they can’t afford to work for less than their private sector counterparts.
I never minded working for less than my private sector counterparts on accounta I liked the security… I realize that makes me a second rater…
But I think that even the janitors and secretaries deserve a living wage. and that’s not a minimum wage. it’s enough to raise kids, save for retirement, buy health insurance and not live in a slum.
So try the Cameron approach, and say don’t cut services and wages of the actual people who do the work until the managers have been cut. Actually I some times wonder how much all the studies we read about really cost. Perhaps its just cheaper to do whatever is suggested than study it to death. But I do think the idea that managers and administrators State and local governments should not be paid more than the state governor makes sense, (in particular university presidents and top administrators). If they say they can’t get the top people, perhaps mediocre people could do just as well. But then the government is just a reflection of private industry which reflects the sports world in becoming very much a steep pyramid in terms of comphensation.
my agency had a famous study done. spent a lot of money to find out what we did. apparently the big bosses had forgotten. the study sent around some questionnaires asking people what they did. the small people (me) answered modestly or over modestly. the bosses (middle bosses) answered extravagantly about how hard and responsible their jobs were. so the study recommended all the workers get pay cuts and the bosses get pay raises.
i will say that the least big of the bosses took the workers side and said “this won’t fly.” so our pay was not obviously cut (though our prospects of advancement were), but the bigger bosses got their raises.
Bruce Webb, are you out there? I could search the web for an answer but I know the AB Webb will have it more readily available. For the FY 2012 what is the amount of the FICA shortage relative to benefits that will be covered by he Trust Fund?
it depends on what happens with the payroll tax holiday. If I remember the FICA shortfallwithout the holiday was in the range of 20 Billion and the Benefits are in the range of 700Billion, but my memory is not reliable. The tax holiday takes about 100 Billion away from FICA revenues.
If you haven’t noticed take a look around the web….you will find an increasing number of info and posts and articles on SS. They will be much more common. The trick to debate in the current atmosphere is sticking to message and say it a lot.
I was suprised to hear that if you pass 65 and have a child under 18 the child gets a $800/month payment. This is just like the wives share of ss (if she has a lower earning record than 1/2 of husbands benefit), a pure welfare benefit. So people now work to game the system by applying for benefits in one mode and then later changing to another, i.e. on husband so the wife does not start her benefits until 70 for example. I can see it for the Survivor benefit, (after all it is Old Age Surviors and Disability insurance) but no one talks much about the second and third benefit. Does anyone have an example of how much the Survivors and Disability and things like the wife and child benefit cost a year?
Coberly My eventual point is that the $20B, if that’s the number, would be paid by redemptin of Trust Fund assets. Granted that the general budget would be the source of that $20B, but that is still a very small part of the general budget. No amount of benefits modification would, therefore, have any significant of the deficit size. Of course our genious President, that leftist/progressive, has seen fit to give America a tax holiday and really make a case for killing the Trust Fund assets altogether. I have a difficult time understanding what Obama’s agenda truly is.
I bet a lot less than the money going to RAND Corp to figure out how to sell a new missile sub, when the Russians’ boats are rusting away.
Or a Navy humbug factory to sell the $14B a copy Ford class carrier when the ChiCom carrier Shi Lang currently with no engines is an old Soviet boat (Varyag) in refit for the past 10 years………………………
When I hear folks worry how the money in the pentagon is spent, which is taking away from widows orphans and old codgers’ minor kids I would worry about the guy my age with a minor child.
disability benefits are published in the Trustees Report. it’s a separate program from OASI. and because it’s “needs based” it has problems that OASI does not. last time i looked it needed about a dollar and a half per week raise in the tax to stay “actuarily solvent.” without DI Social Security needs no tax increase until after 2026, and that would be about 80 cents per week.
I have heard about the games with spouses benefits, but i never heard that they amounted to anything. same with kids benefits when old dad retires. in the nature of things, those kids benefits are more likely to be paid when dad simply dies at a fairly young age. but if you can find the statistics please let us know.
i agree totally. and it’s worth remembering the general budget is not “giving” the money to Social Security, it’s repaying money it borrowed FROM Social Security. It is also worth remembering that the cash shortfall was long expected and planned for, that’s why Social Security collected more money than it needed for strict pay as you go.. in order to have a Trust Fund to cover expected periods of cash flow shortage.
The real genius of Our President and his Republican friends is shown by the tax holiday in which Social Security finances are crippled and can now only be made up by “increasing the deficit,” forcing someone like me to make a long explanation about why a program that has nothing to do with the deficit… now does.
It’s like some guy says your daughter is not a virgin… because he has just raped her.
And when you look around to see who “stole the Trust Fund,” it turns out to be Us. Our President gave it to us to spend at Wal Mart because he knew that would make us happier than saving it for our retirement.
Oh BTW, I on a more personal economic note, my youngest son got married yesterday and my middle son finally found a job in his chosen field. I’m not sure which is better news.
Gail Collins introduces us to the Wisconsin “good ole boys”:
“Wisconsin’s Democratic state senators went into hiding to deprive the Republican majority of the quorum they need to pass Walker’s agenda. The Senate majority leader, Scott Fitzgerald — who happens to be the brother of the Assembly speaker, Jeff Fitzgerald — believes the governor is absolutely right about the need for draconian measures to cut spending in this crisis. So he’s been sending state troopers out to look for the missing Democrats.
The troopers are under the direction of the new chief of the state patrol, Stephen Fitzgerald. He is the 68-year-old father of Jeff and Scott and was appointed to the $105,678 post this month by Governor Walker.”
Good to know there is some kind of collective bargaining going on.
Shades Of Texas! MA is only a little less showy about family.
As a sign of the level of ignorance that pervades the media Bill Maher, a professed liberal/progressive, presented a major amount of misinformation regarding Social Security and the budget deficit. The first sign that ignorance was about to be the basis of the discussion was the absence of any panel members with any significant knowledge of the issue. Bill presented Social Security, Medicare/medicaid and the military as co=equal contributors to the deficit. There was no reference at all to FICA as an independent and dedicated funding stream for benefits. Nor was there any reference to the Trust Fund as the source of benefit supplementation in the event of a FICA deficiency. All in all it was a totally information free zone at the desk of Mr Maher. This from a program host who prides himself as being a knowledgeable supporter of a liberal/progressive ideology. That is truly troublesome.
Maher had a brief tete a tete with Tavis Smiley over Bill’s ill chosen remarks about Muslim/Arab men and their attitudes towards women. Those remarks being set off by the nasty incident suffered by Lara Logan in Egypt. Tavis tried to point out that branding an entire culture by the actions of a group from that culture was irresponsible. He went a step further and suggested that there is a large sector of American men who do not hold very good attitudes themselves. Again, the distinction in this argument being that Maher generally holds himself out to be well informed and intelligent on social issues. All in all both discussions cold have been led by Ann Coulter rather than Bill to the same effect. It was an extremely dismal night for intelligent discussion on a widely syndicated TV program.
jack
i may be wrong about this because i don’t pay a lot of attention, but wasn’t ann coulter bill maher’s girlfriend?
these people all go to the same cocktail parties and think that what they hear there is the inside dope.
Remember Maher is a “comic”.
At least Maher includes warprofiteers in the one word deficit problem.
For him it is: socialsecuritymedicareidsabilitymedicaidmilitarism.
A bit more inclusive and that is a liberal thing than: socialsecuritymedicareidsabilitymedicaid.
That the deficit is driven by socialsecuritymedicareidsabilitymedicaidmilitarism is a cruel joke from “serious” people.
Observe Table 8-8 of the 2012 US budget presented to the world and inside the beltway on 14 Feb 2011, right on time which is much better than the entire pentagon could do on an airplane of ship.
All figures in $2005 constant dollsrs so you can price a tank in real $ not %
1969: $519B (US entangled in Southeast, Northeast Asia and Western Europe)
1979: $314B (Jimmy Carter applying Adm Rickover management policies to the war machine)
1989: $482B (Star Wars and filling the war profiteers’ trough)
1999: $348B (Cold War peace dividend minimized by unwarranted influence)
2010 $608B (overflowing trough for war profiteers and foreign dictators’)
In 2012 budget the war machine gets 19.9% of outlays.
Three times what the UK MoD gets and 5 or 6 times what the Bundeswehr comsumes.
Too much war profiteering going on at the expense of better uses of the money.
Oh! THOSE family values!
This (mine, here) is an irresponsible observation:
I had not known that Carter trimmed the defense budget. I did read recently that the Neocons arose in response to NIxon’s efforts at détente with the USSR. Not to get all paranoid about it (no lizard beings from outer space in my philosophy) but it does seem as if presidents who cut defense spending run into all sorts of problems. Just goes to show, I guess, that if they aren’t smart about defense, they just aren’t smart enough to govern.
coberly,
GHW Bush not only got on the wrong side of the neo cons for raising taxes he was more like Jimmy Carter than he gets credit for. His cuts to DoD were continued by Clinton, and the industry was livid at GHW Bush in 1991 for allowing Cheney to kill the A-12.
Note the US Navy is still floating 11 carriers even without the A-12.
Carter did some good things, zero based budgeting keeping the B-1 in test, building F-16’s and A 10’s, but cutting back and limiting procurements to things that work.
The uselessness of the US military in the face of the Arab oil embargo, helped the folks recognized the war machine was not all it was cracked up to be.
Thus Carter is villified, wrongly to imply St Ronald kept the Red horde away by enriching the war machine and voodoo economics.
Militarism is not patriotism.
Had Carter been reelected……………………….
The House this AM passed HR-1, the 2011 continuing resolution.
Related to the topic of budget cutting. Has anyone noticed that Cameron in the UK is going against local council managers who make more than he does (he is the Prime Minister). They are publishing a list. Why don’t the governors add this to the mix, propose that no state employee make more than the governor? Given what happened in Bell Ca, (all be it that is a runaway train of a case), one suspects that state and locals perhaps pay more than need be for managers, as well as for professional services. Its clear they pay far to much for investment banking services for example. If we are going to cut lets cut these services also.
For whatever good it might do I sent the emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 1968: $12.50/hr
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 2008: $15.00/hr
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/charts/view/201
During the same span average income doubled from $14,000/hr to $28,000/yr!
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/people/P01AR_2009.xls
******
The federal minimum wage is now $3/hr below what it was in 1968:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr
Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr
http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom.
Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise!
I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $$12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html
******
Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
For whatever good it might do I sent the emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 1968: $12.50/hr
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 2008: $15.00/hr
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/charts/view/201
During the same span average income doubled from $14,000/hr to $28,000/yr!
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/people/P01AR_2009.xls
******
The federal minimum wage is now $3/hr below what it was in 1968:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr
Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr
http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom.
Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise!
I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html
******
Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
Today, 10:18:06 AM – Flag – Like – Reply – Delete – Edit – Moderate
For whatever good it might do I emailed the note below to Wisconsin state legislators and everybody with an email adress who might be interested at several Wisconsin (and one Ohio) newspapers:
One stat tracks the disappearance of America’s — collectively bargaining — middle class:
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 1968: $12.50/hr
US median wage (the average person’s) wage, 2008: $15.00/hr
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/charts/view/201
During the same span average income doubled from $14,000/hr to $28,000/yr!
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/people/P01AR_2009.xls
******
The federal minimum wage is now $3/hr below what it was in 1968:
Federal minimum wage 1968: ($1.60 nominally) $10.15/hr
Federal Minimum wage, 2001: $7.25/hr
http://www.minneapolisfed.org/
Doubling the federal minimum wage might add only 3% to the cost of living — that is how little money goes to the bottom.
Doubling the federal minimum wage (to today’s median wage) would add how much to the price of housing, health care, transportation, clothing, electronics? A Big Mac could go up 33% (fast food being by far the biggest labor user) — but half the country would get a raise!
I worked out 2% inflation from $7.25 to $12.50 here: http://ontodayspagelinks.blogspot.com/2008/08/3-cost-of-gdp-output-and-inflation.html
******
Today America is being fought over by two elites. The liberal elite wants to tear up the social fabric (TSA invasiveness) while the conservative elite wants to tear up the economy (tax cuts for the rich-to-deregulated banks-to-borrowers who can’t pay back). When I was a kid (67 years old now) the liberals healed the social fabric while the conservatives guarded the economy.
When I was a kid the average person still counted because unions gave us economic and political leverage: as much organization as any special interest and the majority of votes.
This is not the time for Wisconsin to disband the last bastion of American labor, government unions.
drew
important and interesting enough to be worth a little careful proof reading, and more clarity about “constant dollars.”
ilsm
yes, i was thinking about Bush elder. I should have included him among those who got in trouble.
Lyle
I can hear the howling from here. I agree that managers are overpaid and there are too many of them. But they will tell you they can’t afford to work for less than their private sector counterparts.
I never minded working for less than my private sector counterparts on accounta I liked the security… I realize that makes me a second rater…
But I think that even the janitors and secretaries deserve a living wage. and that’s not a minimum wage. it’s enough to raise kids, save for retirement, buy health insurance and not live in a slum.
So try the Cameron approach, and say don’t cut services and wages of the actual people who do the work until the managers have been cut. Actually I some times wonder how much all the studies we read about really cost. Perhaps its just cheaper to do whatever is suggested than study it to death. But I do think the idea that managers and administrators State and local governments should not be paid more than the state governor makes sense, (in particular university presidents and top administrators). If they say they can’t get the top people, perhaps mediocre people could do just as well. But then the government is just a reflection of private industry which reflects the sports world in becoming very much a steep pyramid in terms of comphensation.
coberly,
Nothing I do ever satisfies you. :-[
Drew
sorry if i sounded unsatisfied. i was saying “Go for it Drew, but you might want to proofread it and edit it a bit.”
That’s an old schoolteacher’s way of saying “Great work Drew. Clean it up and submit it for publication.”
Lyle
my agency had a famous study done. spent a lot of money to find out what we did. apparently the big bosses had forgotten. the study sent around some questionnaires asking people what they did. the small people (me) answered modestly or over modestly. the bosses (middle bosses) answered extravagantly about how hard and responsible their jobs were. so the study recommended all the workers get pay cuts and the bosses get pay raises.
i will say that the least big of the bosses took the workers side and said “this won’t fly.” so our pay was not obviously cut (though our prospects of advancement were), but the bigger bosses got their raises.
coberly,
Oh; okay. That’s better.
Bruce Webb, are you out there? I could search the web for an answer but I know the AB Webb will have it more readily available. For the FY 2012 what is the amount of the FICA shortage relative to benefits that will be covered by he Trust Fund?
.
Jack
while waiting for Bruce
it depends on what happens with the payroll tax holiday. If I remember the FICA shortfallwithout the holiday was in the range of 20 Billion and the Benefits are in the range of 700Billion, but my memory is not reliable. The tax holiday takes about 100 Billion away from FICA revenues.
If you haven’t noticed take a look around the web….you will find an increasing number of info and posts and articles on SS. They will be much more common. The trick to debate in the current atmosphere is sticking to message and say it a lot.
I was suprised to hear that if you pass 65 and have a child under 18 the child gets a $800/month payment. This is just like the wives share of ss (if she has a lower earning record than 1/2 of husbands benefit), a pure welfare benefit. So people now work to game the system by applying for benefits in one mode and then later changing to another, i.e. on husband so the wife does not start her benefits until 70 for example. I can see it for the Survivor benefit, (after all it is Old Age Surviors and Disability insurance) but no one talks much about the second and third benefit.
Does anyone have an example of how much the Survivors and Disability and things like the wife and child benefit cost a year?
And finally some posts centered on the budget/deficit.
Coberly
My eventual point is that the $20B, if that’s the number, would be paid by redemptin of Trust Fund assets. Granted that the general budget would be the source of that $20B, but that is still a very small part of the general budget. No amount of benefits modification would, therefore, have any significant of the deficit size. Of course our genious President, that leftist/progressive, has seen fit to give America a tax holiday and really make a case for killing the Trust Fund assets altogether. I have a difficult time understanding what Obama’s agenda truly is.
Lyle,
I bet a lot less than the money going to RAND Corp to figure out how to sell a new missile sub, when the Russians’ boats are rusting away.
Or a Navy humbug factory to sell the $14B a copy Ford class carrier when the ChiCom carrier Shi Lang currently with no engines is an old Soviet boat (Varyag) in refit for the past 10 years………………………
When I hear folks worry how the money in the pentagon is spent, which is taking away from widows orphans and old codgers’ minor kids I would worry about the guy my age with a minor child.
Other than wonder how he keeps up!
Lyle
disability benefits are published in the Trustees Report. it’s a separate program from OASI. and because it’s “needs based” it has problems that OASI does not. last time i looked it needed about a dollar and a half per week raise in the tax to stay “actuarily solvent.” without DI Social Security needs no tax increase until after 2026, and that would be about 80 cents per week.
I have heard about the games with spouses benefits, but i never heard that they amounted to anything. same with kids benefits when old dad retires. in the nature of things, those kids benefits are more likely to be paid when dad simply dies at a fairly young age. but if you can find the statistics please let us know.
Jack
i agree totally. and it’s worth remembering the general budget is not “giving” the money to Social Security, it’s repaying money it borrowed FROM Social Security. It is also worth remembering that the cash shortfall was long expected and planned for, that’s why Social Security collected more money than it needed for strict pay as you go.. in order to have a Trust Fund to cover expected periods of cash flow shortage.
The real genius of Our President and his Republican friends is shown by the tax holiday in which Social Security finances are crippled and can now only be made up by “increasing the deficit,” forcing someone like me to make a long explanation about why a program that has nothing to do with the deficit… now does.
It’s like some guy says your daughter is not a virgin… because he has just raped her.
And when you look around to see who “stole the Trust Fund,” it turns out to be Us. Our President gave it to us to spend at Wal Mart because he knew that would make us happier than saving it for our retirement.
I am only one person and a volunteer. Please have Peterson forward a tip to the jar and I promise to respond more quickly to your requests. 🙂
Oh BTW, I on a more personal economic note, my youngest son got married yesterday and my middle son finally found a job in his chosen field. I’m not sure which is better news.
Congratulations to your sons, Jack. That is good news.