Again, you don't seem to know what you're talking about. By law the SS trust must be invested in interest bearing securities.

Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Someone that is in their 40's should be waiting until they are 70.

I have been paying in since 1964 and now I have to wait till I'm 66 not 65 to collect.

but I do, I posted this earlier, the govenment has issued IOU's to itself for any SS overage and promises to pay it back sometime and lumped the amount onto the National Debt...don't know about you...but if a guy running trillion dollar deficits gives me an IOU promising that the money will just materialize at a later date even though the account that the IOU is written on is overdrawn and will be so for as far as the eye can see....welll???

Paid-in contributions that exceed the amount required to fully fund current payments to beneficiaries are invested in securities issued by the federal government. The securities issued under this scheme constitute the assets of the Social Security Trust Fund. Because under current federal law these securities represent future obligations that must be repaid, the federal government includes these securities within the overall national debt.[1] The portion of the national debt that is not considered "publicly held" represents the obligations incurred by the government to itself, the bulk of which consists of the government's obligations to the Social Security Trust Fund. now that's funny...and you wonder where Wall Street get's all of their crazy ideas

you should start you own Ponzi scheme Spence :uhuh:

I'm 49 and not thrilled with 70:fury: Just keep bending over and taking it like a good American or be a public employee .

49! You will live to you are 100 ,in your case it should be 80, they will have the miracle drug by the time your 60 :) :)

just an update :)

Sacred Cows: Why Lawmakers Are Stuck on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security
ABC News Feb. 17, 2011

With all the finger-pointing in Washington this week over the need to reform Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, one thing is clear: it might just be Americans' very sense of entitlement to those programs that's the biggest barrier to getting something done.


The three programs have ballooned to 57 percent of the government budget this year and are widely cited as the most significant contributors to the federal deficit, something nearly all Americans want to see aggressively brought under control.

It hurts to get out of bed now. Obama care has other plans for me:hang:

"Americans' very sense of entitlement to those programs that's the biggest barrier to getting something done"
Imagine the nerve of feeling you should get something you paid for your whole working life.

Bingo.
I think it is fair to add a year to your age group and a few years to mine, but we have been paying into it.

The Social Security system is primarily a pay-as-you-go system, meaning that payments to current retirees come from current payments into the system. In the early 1980s, however, the financial projections of the Social Security Administration indicated near-term revenue from payroll taxes would not be sufficient to fully fund near-term benefits (thus raising the possibility of benefit cuts).



Government will have to borrow to pay Social Security IOUs
March 14, 2010 3:33 PM
The Associated Press

PARKERSBURG, W.Va. • The retirement nest egg of an entire generation is stashed away in this small town along the Ohio River: $2.5 trillion in IOUs from the federal government, payable to the Social Security Administration.

It's time to start cashing them in.

For more than two decades, Social Security collected more money in payroll taxes than it paid out in benefits — billions more each year.

Not anymore. This year, for the first time since the 1980s, when Congress last overhauled Social Security, the retirement program is projected to pay out more in benefits than it collects in taxes — nearly $29 billion more.

Sounds like a good time to start tapping the nest egg. Too bad the federal government already spent that money over the years on other programs, preferring to borrow from Social Security rather than foreign creditors. In return, the Treasury Department issued a stack of IOUs — in the form of Treasury bonds — which are kept in a nondescript office building just down the street from Parkersburg's municipal offices.

Now the government will have to borrow even more money, much of it abroad, to start paying back the IOUs, and the timing couldn't be worse. The government is projected to post a record $1.5 trillion budget deficit this year, followed by trillion dollar deficits for years to come.

Social Security's shortfall will not affect current benefits. As long as the IOUs last, benefits will keep flowing. But experts say it is a warning sign that the program's finances are deteriorating. Social Security is projected to drain its trust funds by 2037 unless Congress acts, and there's concern that the looming crisis will lead to reduced benefits.

For more than two decades, regardless of which political party was in power, Congress has been accused of raiding the Social Security trust funds to pay for other programs, masking the size of the budget deficit.

But to illustrate the government's commitment to repaying Social Security, the Treasury Department has been issuing special bonds that earn interest for the retirement program. The bonds are unique because they are actually printed on paper, while other government bonds exist only in electronic form.

They are stored in a three-ring binder, locked in the bottom drawer of a white metal filing cabinet in the Parkersburg offices of Bureau of Public Debt. The agency, which is part of the Treasury Department, opened offices in Parkersburg in the 1950s as part of a plan to locate important government functions away from Washington, D.C., in case of an attack during the Cold War.

One bond is worth a little more than $15.1 billion and another is valued at just under $10.7 billion. In all, the agency has about $2.5 trillion in bonds, all backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. But don't bother trying to steal them; they're nonnegotiable, which means they are worthless on the open market.

More than 52 million people receive old age or disability benefits from Social Security. The average benefit for retirees is a little under $1,200 a month. Disabled workers get an average of $1,100 a month.

Social Security is financed by payroll taxes — employers and employees must each pay a 6.2 percent tax on workers' earnings up to $106,800. Retirees can start getting early, reduced benefits at age 62. They get full benefits if they wait until they turn 66. Those born after 1960 will have to wait until they turn 67.

Social Security's financial problems have been looming for years as the nation's 78 million baby boomers approached retirement age. The oldest are already there. As that huge group of people starts collecting benefits — and stops paying payroll taxes — Social Security's trust funds will shrink, running out of money by 2037, according to the latest projection from the trustees who oversee the program.

The recession is making things worse, at least in the short term. Tax receipts are down from the loss of more than 8 million jobs, and applications for early retirement benefits have spiked from older workers who were laid off and forced to retire.

Stephen C. Goss, chief actuary for the Social Security Administration, says the crisis has been years in the making. "If this helps get people to look more seriously at that in the nearer term, that's probably a good thing. But it's only really a punctuation mark on the fact that we have longer-term financial issues that need to be addressed."

In the short term, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects that Social Security will continue to pay out more in benefits than it collects in taxes for the next three years. It is projected to post small surpluses of $6 billion each in 2014 and 2015, before returning to indefinite deficits in 2016.

For the budget year that ends in September, Social Security is projected to collect $677 billion in taxes and spend $706 billion on benefits and expenses.

Social Security will also collect about $120 billion in interest on the trust funds, according to the CBO projections, meaning its overall balance sheet will continue to grow. The interest, however, is paid by the government, adding even more to the budget deficit.

While Congress must shore up the program, action is unlikely this year, said Rep. Earl Pomeroy, D-N.D., who just took over last week as chairman of the House subcommittee that oversees Social Security.

"The issues required to address the long-term solvency needs of Social Security can be done in a careful, thoughtful and orderly way and they don't need to be done in the next few months," Pomeroy said.

The national debt — the amount of money the government owes its creditors — is about $12.5 trillion( I think we just passed 14 trillion), or nearly $42,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. About $8 trillion has been borrowed in public debt markets, much of it from foreign creditors. The rest came from various government trust funds, including retirement funds for civil servants and the military. About $2.5 trillion is owed to Social Security.

Good luck to the politician who reneges on that debt, said Barbara Kennelly, a former Democratic congresswoman from Connecticut who is now president of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.

"Those bonds are protected by the full faith and credit of the United States of America," Kennelly said. "They're as solid as what we owe China and Japan.":rotf2:

CNN Money
Useless: The Social Security trust fund
August 10, 2010: 11:24 AM ET


FORTUNE -- There's real money in the world, then there's funny money -- stuff that looks real, but isn't.

Today, let's talk about one of the world's biggest piles of funny money -- the $2.54 trillion Social Security trust fund. The trust fund matters now, because Social Security revealed last week that it plans to tap it for $41 billion this year, and will begin tapping it on a regular basis in less than five years.

This year's cash deficit, the first since the early 1980s and the biggest ever, means the Treasury will have to borrow money to redeem some of the trust fund's Treasury securities. Even at a time when Uncle Sam is borrowing $1.5 trillion a year to keep his checks from bouncing, $41 billion is real money.

Here's why the trust fund has no economic value. Let's say I begin taking Social Security when I hit the full retirement age of 66 later this year. Because its tax revenues are below its expenses, Social Security would have to cash in about $3,400 of its trust fund Treasury securities each month to get the money to pay my wife and me. The Treasury, in turn, would have to borrow $3,400 from investors to get the money to pay Social Security. The bottom line is that the government has to borrow from investors to pay me, regardless of how big the trust fund is.



Why the Social Security trust fund is useless - Aug. 10, 2010

No Brian,
See I have a problem paying for others who don't do there jobs right. I didn't screw up SS.
SS was not set up to cover every person who claims a disability. Medacare was not set up to make scooter and stair elevator companies rich. You could cut the cost by 25% (open your eyes) of all these programs just in by stopping abuse and waste alone.
Being passive and allowing this BS to continue WILL NOT fix anything.

The Coalition for Insurance Fraud reported $23.7 Billion in improper
billing in Medicare and Medicaide in 2007 alone.

WTH, who's watching the hen house. :huh: