No news dump for today…Still recovering from the eye injury….Sue has taken my PC and tablet away from me….but she left my phone for me to entertain myself….I hope to be back 100% on Monday….thanx for bearing with me while I get my eye back to normal….I will try to get caught up with my comments then.
As usual the GOP is attacking Social Security every time they have some small amount of power they want to screw the seniors of this country.
But where did all this hatred begin with?
To answer that question easily….it began with Reagan in the 1980s.
In 1983, just before signing legislation that cut Social Security benefits, then-President Ronald Reagan declared that “we’re entering an age when average Americans will live longer and live more productive lives.”
But Reagan’s assumption of ever-rising life expectancy in the U.S. turned out to be false, according to a new analysis, a fact with painful consequences for those who saw their Social Security benefits pared back thanks to the 1983 law’s gradual increase of the full retirement age—the age at which one is eligible for unreduced Social Security payments.
As Conor Smyth wrote Monday for the People’s Policy Project, a left-wing think tank, the Social Security Amendments of 1983 hiked the full retirement age “from 65 in 2000 to 67 at the end of 2022.”
“What this actually meant was not that the age at which people could retire and start drawing Social Security benefits changed—that remained at 62,” Smyth explained. “Instead, by raising what’s called the full retirement age (FRA) by two years, the law effectively cut benefit levels across the board, regardless of the age that any particular individual began claiming Social Security benefits. The result is that those retiring at 62 today face a 50% greater penalty for retiring before the change than they would have before 2000.”
The 1983 law was an outgrowth of a special presidential commission headed by Alan Greenspan, a right-wing economist who would go on to serve as chair of the Federal Reserve for nearly two decades.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/reagan-social-security-cuts
This is a perpetual thing….if it is a GOP Congress then seniors benefits are in danger….which is amazing because the GOP’s greatest supporters are those that will suffer the most if they ever fulfill their wish of destroying the Social Security program.
Why is that?
Are these voters uninformed or just ignorant?
Why does anyone vote against their best interests?
Why?
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”
Why does anyone vote against their best interests? South Carolina since April 12, 1861.
I know and it is the question I ask every election in my state. chuq
I hope your recovery is swift and painless.
Thank you for your kind words. chuq
They are uninformed, only halfway intelligent and consumed with apathy and an obsession with fulfilling their immediate gratifications.
And the attacks never cease. chuq
Terrific insight – people who will be hurt most support those who want to take away their benefits…any adjustment to the system has to acknowledge the promises made in the past – sadly this issue has been turned into a racial one as the message of “those people who don’t deserve it” underlies everything said
We can thank Reagan and his lame ass “Welfare Queens”…..chuq
To be fair, this money is taken from Citizens without their consent. The withholding is no different than a tax. Personally, I’d rather have that money back to invest in my retirement as I see fit. Otherwise, I have no issue with anyone desiring to consensually participating in a government run retirement program.
THeir money is returned to them and for many it is their retirement fund. I see no problem with this. chuq
Perhaps they get some/most of their money back. It’s still non-consensual, whether some people like it or not.
You had Reagan, we had Thatcher around the same time. Nothing was ever the same in Britain after she dismantled it.
Best wishes, Pete.
Same here…privatization has destroyed much of our institutions. chuq