Great podcast, great.

Benedict Beckeld on Oikophobia—Fashionable Disdain For Your Own Culture

Philosopher Benedict Beckeld talks to Jonathan Kay about why so many intellectuals and young people loathe the culture of the West.

Debra Messing finds herself in something of a mess when she wished prison rape on Donald Trump.

Meh. Fuck Debra Messing. Never watched a single episode of Will & Grace in either incarnation and don't intend to start now.

OMG who GAF what B-list celebrities say. Or A-list ones.

Like seriously, who hasn't had a moment of being an asshole. Like Melania's Trump "fuck Christmas".

Like there isn't a whole army of moms out there who hasn't said that at some point.

An outstanding example of Beckeld's Oikophopia: The viciousness of this dishonesty is inexplicable but as a broad historical tilt toward lunacy.

Puh-leeze listen to that podcast. The world is full of great news, but the pattern of history is that the strong squander the dearest treasure.

Well, NicoleK, the difference is Melania was venting in private. Messing is intentionally publicizing herself being an asshole. Multiple times in fact.

So yes, everyone pees and poops but there is a big difference between using a restroom and dropping trou in Times Square.

NicoleK, as I'm sure many have said by now, if you're not a practicing Christian, Christmas is for children. (I don't even much enjoy listening to the few professional recordings of carols I've collected, anymore, aside from a few obscure carols - such as foreign ones that aren't well known in the U.S. I'd enjoy doing the cooking more if it weren't for the fact that after a certain age, one simply has to eat tiny meals, Every Day.)

However, in the interest of maintaining family ties during the pandemic - and future ties in general - I've been busy putting together and mailing out boxes of forgotten-gem books to six sets of young cousins, plus a friend's kids and my nieces. (Most were written before 1980.) THAT I enjoy. Keeping kids' literacy alive is just as important as diet and exercise for them, IMO. Especially in an age when it's getting to be almost impossible to find a family that actually restricts kids' screen time!

Bill Maher had a good segment on that, in 2018:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sQOAtztz8fc

The relevant part is in the last two minutes. The other four minutes, as you might guess, are about Trump. (Btw, Michael Moore said pretty much the same thing, in 2016, about the "bond" with the people.)

What's weird, though, is that Maher USED to say things like "if I want to be bored, I'll read." Then again, maybe that was just an act - part of his image as a shallow, libidinous, middle-aged teenager. I certainly hope so - certain other profane comedians would never have been THAT shallow.

My family has got a lot of traditions that are more appreciated by adults ... like listening to Bach's Weinacht Oratorium while we light the candles on the tree (the kids find the music a bit long), reading the Bible (and yes, I'm Wiccan, so what, I can still enjoy a good story that has cultural significance to me)... or the mushroom truffle pâté and the formal dinner (kids would rather have spaghetti).

It's the gift giving that should only be for kids. I would happily do without any other scented candles or bath salts.

Debra Messing is trying really hard to be like Better Middler ie. be as vulgar as she can be in order to stay relevant in the media.

Has she even been in anything lately?

This is not pooping in Times Square, this is pooping in public in the sense that pooping in the middle of the woods is technically public... Debra Messing is nowhere near Times Square.

[T]he side effects of these vaccines can be considerable; many people will feel pretty sick for a day or two. That’s actually a good sign, because those side effects are your immune system running practice exercises against the dummy viral proteins. When the enemy actually shows up, your highly trained warrior cells will be ready to go all William Tecumseh Sherman on the virus.

What, did you think a vaccine meant the problem was going to be handled for you?



By the way, has anyone heard of a vaccine within China itself yet? Because whaddya know, America made it happen.)

(Which would you prefer, a Chinese vaccine, or the Western one?)

Total dilemma!

If anyone has any ideas, speak up.

NicoleK, if I do something in the woods no one knows about it. Why? Because I am alone. You think posting things on twitter is the same as being alone?

Though I do recognize given how irrelevant Messing is this was the equivalent of pooping in the woods. That isn't what Messing wanted. She wanted to poop in Times Square. And she wanted you to watch as she did it. As Six said she is desperately trying to find an audience and get paid.

Sometimes Sailer swings a very heavy hammer.

I didn't even know what she was famous for. I'd heard the name (someone with a name like "Messing" is pretty hard to forget), but I didn't know what she's been in.

If you do something in the woods and there happens to be a camera there you'd still be in the woods.

Debra Messing is not Times square material.

Patrick, she wasn't really famous, she starred in a sitcom like twenty years ago. That's my point.

NicoleK: Patrick, she wasn't really famous, she starred in a sitcom like twenty years ago. That's my point.

The series Will and Grace ended its first run 14 years ago, and was revived in 2017 and ended this year.

I don't know what your definition of "famous" is, but I would say a co-star of a highly popular sitcom than ran for eleven seasons (all together) qualifies as "famous." Particularly since the series only ended this year.

You're sounding like you're trying too hard to deny her celebrity. She has over 667,700 followers on Twitter. Her net worth is 25 million dollars.

If I tweeted that I hope Donald Trump gets raped in prison, I wouldn't experience anything other than the self-righteous indignation of a few finger-waggers who would (rightly) point out that I was making a rape joke. I'd also probably get more than a few supporters.

When Debra Messing does it, she gets articles written about her, droves of Twitter scolds coming down on her, as well as her fans who insist on defending her. So, yeah, like it or not, she's Times Square, furious as that makes you.

As an aside, I'm surprised no one has called for the cancellation of Eric McCormack, who played Will on the same series. After all, he's a straight guy who played a homosexual. Worse, he played a stereotype.

Not that I want him to be cancelled or think he should be. But I'm reminded of the controversy that brewed over the casting of Scar Jo as Dante "Tex" Gill (of the aborted project Rub and Tug) and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson playing an amputee in Skyscraper, I'm just wondering where the consistency is. (Didn't Paul McCrane also play an amputee on ER?)

And I admit I take a bit of Schadenfreude over the fact that Rub and Tug was never made. The sanctimonious transgendered male actors who hounded Scar Jo out of the role were undoubtedly anticipating themselves to be cast into the role. Whoops. Too bad. You killed the project, so now no one's going to do it.

I always felt like Will was trying too hard to "act gay". I liked him better as a normal guy, as a buffer to the flamboyant friend whassisname. He'd basically be an average Joe, but then occasionally throw in a line about loving musicals or something and they always felt forced.

Didn't know about the 2017 revival.

I also don't care if she tweets tasteless jokes about Trump. As a general rule, I don't understand why we hold actors and musicians to a weird purity standard. Especially when 99% of movies and films seem to be filled with swears and inappropriate lyrics/script.

24% of the budget is obviously too high and figuring out how to wean people off that is important (allowing for fluctuations in say, pandemic years). And the seniors should be cut back, too, but the difference is that a larger percentage of them will be unable to work.

I wonder if creative solutions have been looked at like group housing for seniors... it might be less expensive to use the money to build an apartment for seniors rather than try and give everyone their own money here and there to maintain their own home somewhere else. Of course, no one will like that. But no one will like any solution, they will all suck.

Multi generation homes may be the future. Which I wouldn't like as I do not get along with my MIL. But I think we need to start facing such options.

You are really desperate to twist this into something it is not, NicoleK. This isn't an example of someone filming something that was intended to be private. As Patrick points out Messing has 667,700 twitter followers. She published her words. There was no accident. No invasion of privacy.

"I also don't care if she tweets tasteless jokes about Trump." ~NicoleK

Now I'm with you. You should have just gone with that and ended with that. Because when you go off about purity standards you are full of bullshit again.

When you've moved Gramms — otherwise in good health — into a group home, it may turn out that he solution is not so creative.

...were undoubtedly anticipating themselves to be cast into the role. ~ Patrick at December 15, 2020 9:47 PM

I think that's a great deal of what's behind the carping over "appropriation" in roles in Hollywood. They complainers think if they limit the casting to people with , it will increase the chances of them getting those roles.

William Finchter is under fire for playing a wheelchair bound man in Mom because he is not actually wheelchair bound. Darryl Mitchell, on the other hand, is praised for his portrayal of a wheelchair bound man on NCIS: New Orleans because he is wheelchair bound in real life, following a motorcycle accident.

What the "that's appropriation" folks fail to understand is that very few roles are written specifically for folks. Finchter's role required him to be limited in order to keep his character subordinate to the main character, whereas Mitchell's role could easily be played by someone not wheelchair bound.

The characters in Will and Grace were written specifically to be gay, but structure of the show was I Love Lucy. Messing's neurotic character was there to get laughs, while McCormack's more stable character would play the straight man - Ricky to her Lucy. It was not two gay men living together, something audiences then may not have accepted, but one man living with a crazy and neurotic redhead, a concept already embraced by audiences.

The characters were presented to the audience as ersatz man and wife. Remember, W&G was created in the wake of Ellen DeGeneris flaming out when her show focused on being gay, so the focus here had to be on something other than being gay. As Elton John put it, "We get it, you're gay. Now, be funny." I Love Lucy, a show generally considered funny, was the model on which the show was built. Even the Fred and Ethel supporting characters were in an ersatz marriage.

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...it might be less expensive to use the money to build an apartment for seniors rather than try and give everyone their own money.... ~ NicoleK at December 16, 2020 12:36 AM

The problem is that some people at 80 are still fairly capable and some no longer are at 60. At what age does Granda get warehoused?

Age discrimination in employment, while technically illegal, is widespread, so telling Grandma to get a job won't solve the problem either.

The biggest problem with Social Security is that the fund was essentially absorbed into the general fund and spent decades ago. The actual money was replaced with ("invested in" according to the government) special-issue non-public government bonds, little more than an IOU. We pretend SS is a separate fund, but it's really not and hasn't been for decades.

Social Security is actually two trust funds, the OASI which pays retired workers, and the DI which pays disabled workers. Both funds are outspending their collected revenues.

Whether SS would have been self-sufficient if it had been left alone is a moot point by now. The damage has been done and is nigh irreversible. Most of the proposed solutions - raising the age of eligibility, means testing, etc. - are little more than putting a Band-Aid on a severed limb.

The bonds propping up Social Security cannot be sold on the open market and the government (the borrower) set the interest rate on its own terms - based on the average yield of Treasury securities (typically low risk and low yield) at least four years from maturity. In 2019, the SS funds earned an average interest rate of just over 2% on their "investments." In contrast, the higher-risk equity markets returned over 12% on long-term investments. The average 401K returns 5% to 8%. The inflation rate in December 2019 was just over 2% (the average for the year was just under 2%).

That's what happens when you forget that the less-than sign initiates formatting in HTML and you misspell "blockquote." This is what my post should have looked like:

...were undoubtedly anticipating themselves to be cast into the role. ~ Patrick at December 15, 2020 9:47 PM

I think that's a great deal of what's behind the carping over "appropriation" in roles in Hollywood. They complainers think if they limit the casting to people with [insert distinction here], it will increase the chances of them getting those roles.

William Finchter is under fire for playing a wheelchair bound man in Mom because he is not actually wheelchair bound. Darryl Mitchell, on the other hand, is praised for his portrayal of a wheelchair bound man on NCIS: New Orleans because he is wheelchair bound in real life, following a motorcycle accident.

What the "that's appropriation" folks fail to understand is that very few roles are written specifically for folks. Finchter's role required him to be limited in order to keep his character subordinate to the main character, whereas Mitchell's role could easily be played by someone not wheelchair bound.

The characters in Will and Grace were written specifically to be gay, but structure of the show was I Love Lucy. Messing's neurotic character was there to get laughs, while McCormack's more stable character would play the straight man - Ricky to her Lucy. It was not two gay men living together, something audiences then may not have accepted, but one man living with a crazy and neurotic redhead, a concept already embraced by audiences.

The characters were presented to the audience as ersatz man and wife. Remember, W&G was created in the wake of Ellen DeGeneris flaming out when her show focused on being gay, so the focus here had to be on something other than being gay. As Elton John put it, "We get it, you're gay. Now, be funny." I Love Lucy, a show generally considered funny, was the model on which the show was built. Even the Fred and Ethel supporting characters were in an ersatz marriage.

========================================

...it might be less expensive to use the money to build an apartment for seniors rather than try and give everyone their own money.... ~ NicoleK at December 16, 2020 12:36 AM

The problem is that some people at 80 are still fairly capable and some no longer are at 60. At what age does Granda get warehoused?

Age discrimination in employment, while technically illegal, is widespread, so telling Grandma to get a job won't solve the problem either.

The biggest problem with Social Security is that the fund was essentially absorbed into the general fund and spent decades ago. The actual money was replaced with ("invested in" according to the government) special-issue non-public government bonds, little more than an IOU. We pretend SS is a separate fund, but it's really not and hasn't been for decades.

Social Security is actually two trust funds, the OASI which pays retired workers, and the DI which pays disabled workers. Both funds are outspending their collected revenues.

Whether SS would have been self-sufficient if it had been left alone is a moot point by now. The damage has been done and is nigh irreversible. Most of the proposed solutions - raising the age of eligibility, means testing, etc. - are little more than putting a Band-Aid on a severed limb.

The bonds propping up Social Security cannot be sold on the open market and the government (the borrower) set the interest rate on its own terms - based on the average yield of Treasury securities (typically low risk and low yield) at least four years from maturity. In 2019, the SS funds earned an average interest rate of just over 2% on their "investments." In contrast, the higher-risk equity markets returned over 12% on long-term investments. The average 401K returns 5% to 8%. The inflation rate in December 2019 was just over 2% (the average for the year was just under 2%).

Benedict Beckeld on Oikophobia—Fashionable Disdain For Your Own Culture ~ Crid at December 14, 2020 9:53 PM

Interesting

There's more from Beckeld here. It's a Quillette article on how oikophobia is driven by what Freud called the "narcissism of small differences" (in his worth-a-read Civilization and Its Discontents).

"The biggest problem with Social Security is that the fund was essentially absorbed into the general fund and spent decades ago." ~Conan

False.

Social Security from the very first day was a transfer payment welfare system. The issue with it's stability is the ratio between payers and beneficiaries. People live longer today, hence there are more beneficiaries per payer than there used to be. As I recall it started around 20 payers per beneficiary and is now under 4, but it is still trying to pay out as if there were 20 people paying in.

In fact in the original 1935 law there was no trust fund. Just a general bank account for basic management. By 1939 congress realized that wasn't going to work. (After all we are talking about a bank account that would have $1 trillion dollars going in and out today.) So they established the 'trust fund'. That was mostly an accounting procedure change to better document what was going on. As for what can and cannot be invested in, from the SSA.gov website:

"Both the 1935 and the 1939 laws specified three types of purchases that might be made: 1) securities on original issue at par; 2) by purchase of outstanding obligations at the market price; and 3) via the issuance of "special obligation bonds" that could be issued only to the Social Security Trust Fund."

Up until 1980 both marketable and non-marketable securities were purchased as part of the 'trust fund'. And it is only bureaucratic preference that changed that. There is nothing in law preventing the SSA from purchasing marketable bonds today. The 1937 amendment is still in effect.

So what has changed over the years? Just how they do the accounting. And given how illegal it would be for you or I to use such accounting schemes I wouldn't put much credence in their numbers. It is more advertising than anything else. No different than 'Tastes great, less filling!' Even the sheets they send out every once in a while have already been ruled to be nothing more than advertising. They have no force of law. You do not have any property rights and you never did.

Grandma gets warehoused when she starts relying on social security. You can get it at any time after the designated age (65 or 70 seeming reasonable). At that point you move into the warehouse, or in with your relatives. If you have enough money to support yourself you don't get it.

Oh it's clear she WANTED to poop in Times Square. But she's a B-list celebrity, twitter followers or not. So who GAF. Why is she news. Or the penis guy at the New Yorker.

And I DID lead with that... see my comment at the top.

The issue with it's [sic] stability is the ratio between payers and beneficiaries. People live longer today, hence there are more beneficiaries per payer than there used to be. ~ Ben at December 16, 2020 8:42 AM

Yes, Ben, and when there are significantly more payers than receivers, the excess funds ostensibly get invested provide a reserve. They were not. The funds for Social Security were absorbed into the general fund with an IOU left in their place - the funds were "invested" in government-backed instruments.

If they had actually been invested in something other than bonds from the start, the fund just might be solvent; "might" being the operative word here. More on that later.

There is nothing in law preventing the SSA from purchasing marketable bonds today. ~ Ben at December 16, 2020 8:42 AM

Nope, but the majority of investments the fund holds today are those special issue Treasury bonds, not anything marketable.

According to Robert Reischauer of the Brookings Institute in 1999:

"Since the program’s inception, the law has required that Social Security reserves be invested exclusively in securities guaranteed as to principal and interest by the federal government. Most trust fund holdings consist of special nonmarketable Treasury securities that carry the average interest rate of government notes and bonds that mature in four or more years and are outstanding at the time the special securities are issued. In addition to their low risk, these special issues have one clear advantage. They can be sold back to the Treasury at par at any time—a feature not available on publicly held notes or bonds, whose market prices fluctuate from day to day. They also have one big disadvantage—they yield relatively low rates of return."

Bonds, Ben, marketable or not, are not growth investments. They're low-risk instruments — especially US Treasury bonds. In a country scarred by the 1929 crash, widespread corporate bond defaults, and the subsequent Depression, it made sense to limit the fund's investment options to government-backed bonds. It makes less sense to do so today.

The 1939 amendment changed the initial payouts to 1940, increased the payout amount, and added spouse and survivor benefits. The original program was to pay small amounts, start paying in 1942, and had no provision for spouse and survivor benefits. Congress, in that 1939 amendment, decided to forego the reserves the program was expected to build and carry, converting it to a pay-as-you-go system.

In 1977, Congress added a "partial reserve" requirement to the program, but a poor economy failed to produce the expected reserves. By 1983, a better economy and added legislation helped produce a reserve, which had grown to over $700 billion by 1998. However, limiting the investments of the fund to low-yield government securities has, over time, helped to squander that reserve, along with population growth, demographic shifts, economic slowdowns, etc.

That low investment yield also means that the payroll tax to fund Social Security is higher than it would need to be with better returns on investment.

Despite my enthusiasm for it, private equity investment is not without its own set of problems.

One problem with investing Social Security funds in private equities is the volatility of the returns. Social Security is a defined-benefit program and must meet a certain obligation every payout period. Shortfalls would require funds from the general revenue be used, a proposition that has been met with significant resistance in American politics, despite, or because of, its widespread use in Europe.

Another problem is that an investment in private equities would require Congress to exhibit fiscal discipline, a trait that body has yet to exhibit in over 200 years. Accounting would need to be done on a risk-adjusted basis, with gains reflected only after they are realized. Unfortunately, advocates of private equity investment tend to count the higher returns as a given and ignore the risk.

Politicization of investments is also a risk. Witness the Obama administration's heavy investment in and funding of "alternative energy" companies that failed. Special interest groups with political influence could restrict the freedom of fund managers to choose their investment instruments; compel investment in or avoidance of chosen causes; or use their influence as blackmail to force publicly-held companies to toe their line. In addition, there is the risk that powerful politicians could steer investments to companies in their own constituencies without regard to the advisability of those investments.

In summation, a government-managed retirement funding program of any sort is an idea fraught with pitfalls. The solution is that Social Security needs to meet its current obligations with people who won't have time to wean themselves from it, (say 45+) — perhaps with a graduated step down of benefits by age — and transition to a tax-deferred private investment program for younger people who have time to build up some retirement savings. Unfortunately, that also means that some people's retirement savings will come up short and we'll need a humane and practical way to deal with that.

In addition, the issue of medical expenses leading to bankruptcy in the elderly will have to be addressed. Universal healthcare is not the answer, but a solution will likely resemble it in some way, at least for the elderly.

Short of a Logan's Run style mandatory death age, this is not an issue that will go away. Kicking the can down the road is pushing us to the brink of a financial crisis.

The solution for the rest of us today is to maximize our savings and investments; along with pushing out our retirement ages, if we can.

If you have enough money to support yourself you don't get it. ~ NicoleK at December 16, 2020 8:54 AM

Simple to say, but who determines that? And by what metric? A nationwide income or savings hurdle ignores the differences in cost of living between geographies.

"If they had actually been invested in something other than bonds from the start, the fund just might be solvent; "might" being the operative word here." ~Conan

No Conan there is no might involved. As a defined benefit welfare program it is inherently unsustainable. The only difference is when does it go unsolvent. That is goes unsolvent is guaranteed.

If you want to do the actual math on revenues, costs, and required rate of return on reserves. You flat can't balance that budget. Not with any realistic rate of return. The primary issue is the ratio between payers and beneficiaries. Without enough people paying in you can't make things work. Hence the periodic calls to bring in a lot of young immigrants to balance various budgets.

Heck, for verification just look at the changes in the tax that funds Social Security. Back in 1937 it was a 1% payroll tax. It then grew at a relatively steady rate of 1% every 5 years up till it hit 15.3% in 1990. At that point people just weren't willing to pay anymore so the rate has remained flat.

There are some good graphs on the program's assets over at wikipedia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_Trust_Fund

Except for around 2000 when the advent of computers lead to unprecedented productivity gains income and outflows to the program more or less matched. And I'm not saying computers were invented in 2000. But that the invention of the computer and the internet lead to unusual economic growth between 1990 and 2010. Aside from that 20 year anomaly this is what you would expect from a transfer payment welfare program like SS.

"If you have enough money to support yourself you don't get it." ~NicoleK (sorry for double teaming you)

Means testing like this is currently being discussed. And implementing like you want is probably the end of social security as we know it. Which may be a good thing. Who knows?

Notice Conan absolutely loathes it when I call Social Security a welfare program. The generation preceding his felt the exact same way. Even today most people don't want to 'be on welfare'. So a key component to SS's longevity is it's deceptive advertising.

Make no mistake. The program is a welfare program. There is no honest debate on that. But the US government has deceptively advertised the program as a savings and investment program. It isn't one and never was. But it has been heavily advertised as one.

Once you 100% means test (the program is already partially means tested) you've probably pushed things too far for the advertising to cover up. When people are putting money in and getting nothing back out you flat can't call it an investment program. The lie is too obvious.

With that change a lot of political things start to happen. How will things shake out, beats me.

As for solvency issues, to bring the program in line with it's current income you need to cut benefits by approximately 20%. That isn't a permanent fix. Just what is needed to bring things in line today. Which is a reduction in spending of ~$200 billion. Given current demographic changes we will probably have to cut things by over 50% by the time my kids are eligible. Assuming the program survives to then.

Ben, don't get all your economic insight from the Austrian school.

I love this seminar on SSI. It saves so much wondering about it.
" Unfortunately, advocates of private equity investment tend to count the higher returns as a given and ignore the risk." CtG

So true. County and municipal pension plans were using 8% for planning last time I checked. Real returns were near half of that. They have no idea what to do now.

I'm just saying run the actual numbers yourself when you slap a might on that claim, Conan. There are multiple problems with SS investing in stocks. But the required unrealistic rate of return is enough to sink what you said.

Also read the actual law. Politicians have been known to lie about things from time to time.

It needs to be treated more like insurance. We all pay into insurance, but the idea is we pay more than we get.

Conan, it just clicked for me why you think just investing in the stock market could make things work. I expect if you invested you could easily beat what is being offered back to you. Me too for what it matters. But you have to remember SS is pretty progressively weighted on the benefits. You aren't just paying for you. You have a couple other people you are paying for as well. There are significant stretches of time where the program as a whole needed to make north of 15% returns to make projected benefits, and well that just isn't realistic. Especially not considering the volume of money we are talking about here.

NicoleK, I'm not sure what you mean by the word 'insurance'. Getting cancer, going blind, having your house burn down are all relatively rare events. Getting old (thankfully) is not.

Ben Says:

"Getting old (thankfully) is not."

This is the elephant in the room when it comes to any discussion of SS.

In 1940 only ~55% of people survived from age 21 to age 65.

As of 1990 ~75% of people survived from age 21 to 65.

When SS was first created it relied heavily on the premise that large swaths of the population would pay in all of their lives and then die before they were eligible.

Survival to retirement age coupled with increased lifespan beyond retirement age has stressed the system in a manner it was not intended to handle.

Pushing out the retirement age for folks close to retirement will cause a revolt because many didn't save much else to cover their expenses in old age... compelling people to work until they are 75 isn't a great strategy either because while life expectancy has indeed increased, those folks aren't necessarily capable of doing the kind of work they did when they were younger and their bodies were less frail.

Life expectancy improvements have unfortunately not tracked with improvements to general health in old age.

Originally this system was primarily designed to care for elderly white widows who never really worked after their husbands died... it needs an overhaul to address modern realities of retirement.

Orion— Are you a bitter Chinese woman from an institution who never had a chance to choose her own career and live the life she secretly always wanted to lead?

Crid,

I think this is a new record for you. You just jumped between 3 separate threads within the last 10 minutes to disrupt on topic conversation to get my attention with your nonsense.

Are you really this desperate for my attention?... do you need help?

It seems like the pandemic is really getting to you?... has no one been able to change your depends or roll you on the bed to prevent bed sores?

You are a good example of why we really need better mental health and elder care in this country.

I feel sorry for you.

Well Artemis, thank you for the civility in that first post. And that has nothing to do with you agreeing with me.

Getting old isn't rare, but getting old with no resources, while not as rare as it should be, is not everyone.

That said raising the age of retirement makes a lot of sense.

1. What Artemis and others said.
2. Here as elsewhere government involvement obscures the underlying reality. If i were legally required to pay into a private retirement fund, the public good of SS would be acheived but the business transaction and the market truths would be clear. And responsibility would remain where it should - with the individual. This is what reform has yielded here in Israel and other places like Argentina (IIRC). Which leads to:

3. What idiot trusts politicians to take care of them when they are no longer productive or powerful?

Especially socialist politicians for whom perpetual immiseration of the masses and victimhood-n-envy are electoral strategies (as demonstrated by the cultivation of black American inner city poverty)?

Ben,

I'm always civil in a thread until someone is uncivil with me.

There is no need to thank me for that... just operate in goof faith and stay on topic and we'll always be fine.

Two more points when it comes to trying to do something about SS.

1 - The contribution cap should be eliminated. There is no reason for peoples taxes to go down after their income exceeds $137,700. This would inject more money into the system from people who it would impact the least in terms of their ability be financially solvent in old age.

2 - While they closed the so-called "file and suspend" loophole for people in the future claiming SS benefits, the folks who took advantage of this essentially robbed the rest of us for extra SS payments. They are continuing to do so as well. In addition to closing the loophole we should stop existing file and suspend payments as well. It makes no sense for current retirees to benefit from extra SS payments at the expense of future retirees getting payments at all.

No Artemis you are not normally civil. You are typically an asshole straight from the very first post. Civil behavior is something you greatly struggle with. Which is why this event required a thank you.

As for uncapping that tax, benefits are capped at that point so the taxes got capped at that point to match. If you uncap both you aren't significantly better financially. If you only uncap the taxes and don't uncap the benefits you are just emphasizing the welfare nature of SS which likely damages it politically.

Ben,

Even just now you are the one starting shit and name calling.

It seems to me that your expectation for "civil" behavior includes you being able to insult others and they just sit there and say nothing.

I always begin a conversation in a civil manner.

Idiots such as yourself simply are not mentally capable of continuing such a conversation.

Do you realize how very stupid you sound when you call someone an asshole and then tell them that they "greatly struggle" with civility?

"I wouldn't get your hopes up too much Arty. I'm still the same ass I've always been." - Ben at May 5, 2020 7:37 PM

That is you back in May with regard to me getting my hopes up that you might act in a civil manner.

This was after you were busy crying about how Crid wasn't being nice to you and how awful it was that somehow you ended up on his "enemies list":

"Busted nothing Crid. Look at this damn thread! It isn't complicated! Who started shit? You. When I refused to take the bait who tried to start things again? You! Why am I on your pathetic 'enemies for life' list?" - Ben at May 4, 2020 5:34 PM

If you want this bog to be civil then act civil... you have no expectation of civility when you are unable to control yourself.

Ben Says:

"As for uncapping that tax, benefits are capped at that point so the taxes got capped at that point to match. If you uncap both you aren't significantly better financially. If you only uncap the taxes and don't uncap the benefits you are just emphasizing the welfare nature of SS which likely damages it politically."

We need only uncap the tax, the benefits can remain where they are.

The point of social security is to provide a financial safety net for people in old age.

The cap presently sits at nearly $140,000... that is precisely the group who we expect to have the longest lifespan anyway (which means they will be getting SS checks longer than folks who spent their lives earning ~$50,000).

The entire idea that you pay in to SS and then get your money back has always been a farce.

As I said before, if you pay in your entire life and then die at 62... you get nothing.

If that is okay, then it is okay for someone to live until 95 and not manage to recoup every penny they put into the system because they earned so very much through their working years.

Most people in the United States do not have an issue with the existence of social safety nets.