This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!
You’re asking a few different questions. But it seems pretty obvious to me that a lot of poor people are receiving more in government services than they pay in taxes. I personally am fine with that but I don’t think we need to pretend that’s not true.
Poor people don't pay much in taxes. But how did the billionaires benefit from the largest transfer wealth in 2008 and in 2020, the transfer might be twice 2008.
If we are the richest country in the world, and the wealthy are getting wealthier. How are they a drain on the taxpayer?
Because most transfers of revenue happen are middle class transfers to the middle class with the bureaucratic mechanisms and inefficiencies thrown in.
Sounds like this really has nothing to do with the poor and is more a complaint about "corporate welfare". Dont get me wrong, thats a fine topic...not sure why he's trying to set it up and rich vs poor though.
of the total budget for the Federal Govt what % goes to social care ?Golf Guy 69 said:
Absolutely not to the bolded. The way I read the survey here, Social Security recipients are fairly evenly spread across the wealth continuum, meaning about 25% of recipients are in the bottom 25% of wealth, another 25% of recipients are in the 25-50% wealth bracket, etc. Note that this measures purely "recipients of Social Security" rather than "amount received". As amounts are based in part on amount contributed, it seems reasonable that wealthier people actually receive more than poor people.
I don't know about those percentages, what i do know is the bulk of the Govt budget is spend on social programs - and the tens of millions who do not work in the USA ? they're getting that money in some way, shape or form
Do you consider medicare, social security and medicaid as part of "social programs" in this statement?
And do you understand that when people are primarily talking about "social programs" they aren't talking about these typically? They are talking about the things that aren't direct line items on their paychecks. That when people are talking about "social programs" they are generally talking about things like SNAP, welfare and various other programs where your general tax dollars go?
I think it's fair to refer to SS and Medicare as social programs. Of course, it's also pertinent to note that these payments, in large part, are going as much or more to middle class and wealthy people than to poor people. Put another way, SS/Medicare aren't really a transfer from rich to poor, but rather a transfer from young to old. Technically, one could argue that they aren't even that, but merely deferred payments from each generation to itself once they've grown older.
Oh, I don't disagree. It's just not the common way to talk about them and they don't work like the other social programs do. I may be assuming some things to come, but I don't I am off on them. I've found it always wise to clearly state what we're talking about with SC so that conflation is kept to a minimum.
Oh, please. I doubt anyone thinks this.Golf Guy 69 said:
Yep, once I hit SS age this program will be a transfer from younger me to older me.
unless you make too much money-then you get skwat from SS even though you have paid in more than you will ever get out. not complaining just saying.
if people don't understand how Fed Govt spends money they need to look into it - where tax money goes and taxes are what the Govt takes, not what people give
At the upper reaches of income your SS becomes 85% taxable, from my understanding, so you're not getting reduced that badly even at a 37% tax rate (in the top income bracket max SS is chump change, anyway).
Tell you what....you shift the goal posts around and let me know when you're settled on a topic/point. Then we can talk. Fair? So far you've failed to answer the question and switched the subject to "entitlement spending" to "spending". The above is absolutely true. Our tax dollars don't go to medicare or social security. We pay a separate amount outside our federal tax dollars to those programs. So, if you want to talk about tax dollars, fine. Let's talk about them. That makes this statementStealthycat said:
FALSE. If you want to talk about medicare and social security we can do that too. Just don't conflate the sources of the two. They are two different revenue streams. It even breaks it out on your pay stub every week.Stealthycat said:
you can break taxation down if you want to and try to separate .... if its not a tax, I'd like to not put into it. is that an option? no ... it isn't
Please correct me if I am reading this wrong, but this sounds like the government borrowed money from SS and now they need their money back to pay out benefits. IMO this adds to deficit, but not at the fault of SS.
Well, that's easy to answer. They don't take from you...the government does.
The biggest portions of our "budget" (if you can even call it that) are medicare and social security from mandatory spending and military from discretionary spending. The "biggest" portions go to those areas, not "people who don't work". The funds going strictly to "the people who don't work" are unemployment benefits. That's approx $5 billion a month. The other programs like welfare, SNAP etc go to both people not working and people working but not able to make enough to get by.
This is for another thread, but generally speaking, this is true. Social security is going to be in trouble because % have not been adjusted to account for the increase in retirees that are filtering through the system. We are living longer and having fewer children. People often look at paying into SS as them giving government their money for when they retire. That's not how it works though. The funds we are putting in today are to support those who are retired today. It's an actual social program. With this sort of system it becomes obvious pretty quickly as to why "fewer young people and more older people" is a problem. We have more people to support and less people to support them. Throw on top of that the SS cap on income and the wealth/pay gap in this country getting larger and larger and it's easy to see why the system needs to be changed.
How much time do you have? Start by reading these links. Don't just click on them and dismiss; really sit down and read all of them. Spoiler: none of them are "blame Trump" articles.
You are 100% wrong that it is "willingly". Again, I would suggest you really take the time to read all three of the articles I mentioned in their entirety. "Glanced over" won't cut it. That is, if your question was in earnest and not trolling, of course.
At some point, if I write a short essay about what's wrong with capitalism, do you want to write something about the benefits of capitalism, and then we can identify what we think the other person left out?
Sure, I would enjoy that. This can be a good substitute for my "Capitalism is immoral" thread that I've wanted to do forever but have been too lazy.
