Buzsaw writes:
The difference is that the Social Security contributions I've paid in were a whole lot more than I would have had to pay into a private retirement plan and receive the same return.
That is simply not true: rarely has one man's post been so wrong about so much.
I've challenged you on this claim before, and you have never offered any proof or analysis to support it. Meanwhile, the Social Security Administration's calculations show, as crashfrog has stated, that SS contributions are exhausted in an average of less than five years.
Got evidence? No? I didn't think so. You'd rather keep claiming the same falsehood, over and over.
We call that propaganda, Buz.
I don't have to be sick to receive Social Security. On the other hand if I take care of my body as I do, there is no need to use Medicare, etc. Social security was suppose to be a retirement plan for all.
Medicare is health insurance for all elderly, just as Social Security is retirement income for all elderly.
Do you truly believe that only people who fail to take proper care of their bodies develop illnesses or injuries?
The Social Security $$ I paid into the system decades ago would have bought 25 to 35 cent a gallon for gas. For Social Security $$ I'm getting back I have to pay $3 to $4 for a gallon of gas. So you young-uns hadn't ought to complain. You're paying $3 to $4 gas money in. If you were to retire on $3 to $4 gas money you'd get a whole lot better deal than us old folks are getting.
What? Are you slipping into senile dementia, Buz? Maybe you will need that Medicare after all.
First, I'm not a "young 'un"--gas was 25 cents a gallon when I first started paying taxes on income. At that time, the SS payroll tax was about 4%; now it is 12.4% (lowered to 10.4% by Pres. Obama, though the GOP is determined to bring it back up).
So, like you, I earned SS credits while paying a much lower tax rate than the "young 'uns" do now. Unlike you, I know that gas will probably cost $35/gallon when the young 'uns retire 40-45 years from now...though the GOP wants to raise the retirement age to 70, so maybe that's $40 a gallon 50 years from now.
The fact is, Buz, that you made out like a bandit on Social Security. You got the lower tax rate AND the lower retirement age. It's that no-account black kid flipping burgers in Herkimer who is paying your Social Security stipend, not you.
It's not fortune. I pray daily for God to provide my needs, keep me well and strong and protect me from harm and loss. Then I pray for the same for all on my prayer list, especially my beloved family and Christian brothers and sisters who know God. This has been often how God reveals himself to be real in a personal way. This, coupled with all of the other corroborating evidence of the Biblical record is why I'm doggedly stick with Christianity.
So all those people who haven't been protected from harm and loss didn't pray right, or hard enough, or something.
This sanctimony is the slimy underbelly of all world religions: if you were right with God, this bad thing wouldn't have happened to you. Whether it's karma or "blessings on the righteous" or Allah's will, the bottom line remains the same: I know how to push God's buttons, and He takes care of me--too bad for you, and your misfortune proves your apostasy.
I've read the book of Job numerous times. Those OT accounts of the patriarchs etc never bore me. They are so much more inspiring than anything in either the Johnny come lately Koran and Book Of Mormon. Their immensely more inspiring than any other religious book. Thus The Bible being the global best seller for so long.
Apparently you read Job without any understanding. To summarize: The most righteous man on earth is tested by God. All is taken from him: his family, his flocks, his health. His wife tells him to curse God and die; his neighbors tell him that he must have offended God in some way--he must be guilty of something to have earned this horrible fate. Job tells them, no, I did not, misfortune rains on the just and unjust alike, and he demands that God answer for this state of affairs.
God appears in a whirlwind, chastens Job with His vastness and mystery--and then tells Job's neighbors that Job spoke the truth.
However righteous you think you are, Buz, and whatever good fortune in health and security you enjoy, you didn't earn it--just like you didn't earn your Social Security.
I'd have thought a Christian, of all people, would understand that.
"If you can keep your head while those around you are losing theirs, you can collect a lot of heads."