Letter to the editor: Social Security supports those who paid into it — and the economy - by Carol Stewart

Found here.

This barely coherent letter to the editor repeats all the typical leftist bumper sticker slogans about Social Security. It almost seems as though she copy and pasted sentences from various leftist websites in order to construct her letter.

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Social Security can benefit future generations – if Congress acts Margie McDonald, Guest columnist

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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The author has nothing new to say. She repeats, almost verbatim, the inane talking points the Left has been using for decades. Here's one recent example.

Inevitably, the Social Security system is proclaimed solvent, followed by recommending crucial fixes. So it isn't solvent. Then, the solution always offered is to increase taxes, always on the rich. Reforms like clamping down on fraud or increasing efficiencies are always rejected.

So the author isn't really advocating for saving Social Security, her intent is to bolster leftist positions and attack and denigrate Republicans. 

She is all-in on The Agenda, and parrots The Narrative. The Agenda is the disassembly of The System, which is the American culture and way of life. The Narrative is the daily talking points disseminated by "Central Command," serving the implementation of The Agenda, and dutifully repeated by the media and talking heads.

Almost everything written here is false, misleading, or mistaken. But that doesn't matter, because accuracy or truth is not relevant. Only The Agenda is relevant.

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The Workers Behind Bozeman’s Boom - by NICK BOWLIN

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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This is a classic agendized puff piece, aimed solely at manipulating the emotions of readers. It is replete with sob stories, evil rich villains, and hand-wringing regarding the plight of the leftist Journalist's preferred victims.

Now, we should say that we are not in favor of anyone suffering. And we do recognize that people can be taken advantage of. This is not acceptable. But it also isn't unique to illegal immigrants. But the obstacles in the way of legal immigration, and the abuse and poverty that comes from this, are problems created by government. 

Further, no one has the right to enter the US. The government is constitutionally empowered to protect its borders, and to limit or even eliminate the number of people coming in. The fact that people are oppressed in other countries is not automatically a problem to be solved by the American people. The fact that people want to come for the possibility of a better life does not justify their presence here.

Lastly, no one has forced these folks to come to Bozeman. No one forces them to stay. If they find life unlivable here, there are many other places they could live.

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The real reason Social Security is going broke And how to save it forever! - by ROBERT REICH

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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Friends,

I run into lots of young people who don’t believe Social Security will be there for them when they retire.

They have reason for concern. The trustees of the Social Security Trust Fund — of which yours truly was once a member (Dr. Reich is apparently proud of his work as a former SS trustee. We were unable to document this claim, and his linkedin profile doesn't mention it.)

— just released their annual report on Social Security’s future. The report says Social Security will be able to pay full benefits until 2034 but then faces a significant funding shortfall. After 2034, it can pay only about 80 percent of scheduled benefits.

The biggest reason Social Security is running out of money is not what you (and the media) think it is: that boomer retirees are, or will soon be, soaking it all up. (Actually, it is already out of money.)

The Social Security trustees anticipated the boom in boomer retirements. This is why Social Security was amended back in 1983, to gradually increase the age for collecting full retirement benefits from age 65 to 67. That change is helping finance the boomers’ retirement. (Oh, so the trustees delayed benefits? Isn't delaying benefits the same thing as cutting benefits?

Dr. Reich is now going to make his argument. We will allow him to do so before we join back in.)

So what did the trustees fail to anticipate? Answer: the degree of income inequality in 21st century America. 

Put simply, a big part of the American working population is earning less than the Social Security trustees (including me) anticipated decades ago — and therefore paying less in Social Security payroll tax.

Had the pay of American workers kept up with what had been the trend decades ago — and kept up with their own increasing productivity — their Social Security payroll tax payments would have been enough to keep the program flush.

At the same time, a much larger chunk of the nation’s total income is going to the top than was expected decades ago.

Here’s the thing: Income subject to the payroll tax is capped. Every dollar of earnings in excess of the cap is not subject to Social Security payroll taxes. This year’s cap is $160,200.

The Social Security cap is adjusted every year for inflation, but the adjustment is tiny compared to what’s happened to incomes at the top.

As the rich have become far richer, more and more of the total income earned by Americans has become concentrated at the top. Therefore, more and more total income escapes the Social Security payroll tax. (Dr. Reich's argument is specious. SS is predominately funded by the middle class on down. This is the way it has always been. The SS cap by definition defines the program as being funded by earners other than the rich, ostensibly because SS benefits are almost all paid to people other than the rich.

Therefore, it is impossible for the trustees to fail to account for "inequality" because any supposed shift in income from being SS taxable to not being SS taxable does not change the overall taxable amount. Dr. Reich would need to demonstrate that there was less actual revenue obtained because because more earners were coming up short of the cap. In other words, there would need to be a gap of sorts between the highest earners under the cap and the cap itself.

Let's take a look at the revenues and expenditures of the SS trust fund to see if we can discern the results of the 1983 reform of SS he mentioned above, and any supposed effect of income inequality:

Notice that subsequent to 1983 the SS deficit increased for several years until the Reagan booming economy kicked in about 1986. This economic upturn had a secondary benefit of reducing SS deficits. The reductions in the SS deficits continued all the way until the early 2000s recession. The deficits we fairly small through GW Bush's presidency, until the Great Recession hit. Then for four straight years the SS deficit was in excess of one trillion dollars, then stayed fairly level until COVID. Then they exploded.

So that's the deficits, which are clearly economic-related. 

Now for the revenues. Revenues increased every year until the early 2000s recession, but started upward again in 2004. There was another drop in the Great Recession, but the recovery was relatively quick. Thereafter there was never another drop in revenue.

Conclusions: The 1983 reforms had no discernible effects. And, there is no evidence that inequality has inhibited revenues or influenced expenditures. Rather, economic rises and falls clearly are a primary influence of both SS revenues and expenditures.)

The obvious solution to Social Security’s funding shortfall 11 years from now is to lift the cap so that the super-rich pay more in Social Security taxes. (Of course, the answer always is more taxes. But as we have seen, it's not a revenue problem. The problem is structural. SS cannot work, since it relies on redistribution. Like every government payout program, there will always be more and more takers and fewer and fewer payers.)

To make sure it’s the super-rich — and not the upper middle class — who pay, (Why?)

it makes sense to eliminate the cap altogether on earnings in excess of, say, $400,000. (Making changes that increase taxes on high income earners is a tacit admission that SS is not a retirement plan, it is a wealth redistribution plan. This is because it is a tax increase towards people who will not receive any benefit whatsoever. 

If someone is taxed without benefit, that is a welfare program.

By the way, the way Dr. Reich phrases this is very odd. Currently the cap is set at $160,200 of income, after which income is not subject to SS tax. So a worker would pay SS tax until his income exceeded the cap, after which his income above the cap would not be taxed.

But Dr. Reich wants to "eliminate this cap altogether." One would expect that he wants income above $160,200 to be taxed. But wait. Then he says taxes should be levied "on earnings in excess of, say,  $400,000." That means he wants to maintain the non-taxed status of income received between $160,200 and $400,000, above which SS taxes are resumed. 

Does that strike anyone as extremely nonsensical?

Below he will admit he's echoing the Biden plan, which states,

Under current law, the 12.4 percent Social Security (OASDI) employer and employee combined payroll tax rate applies to earnings up to the annual taxable maximum level ($137,700 in 2020).

The Biden plan increases Social Security taxes by creating a “donut hole” in the payroll tax structure. While earnings immediately above the current taxable maximum would continue to be exempt from Social Security taxes, earnings above $400,000 would be taxed at the 12.4 percent rate. However, the new taxes on earnings above $400,000 would not trigger additional benefits.

Over time, the donut hole would disappear and all earnings would be subject to full payroll taxes. The reason for this disappearance is that the annual taxable maximum level ($137,700 in 2020) would continue to grow with average wage growth, as under current law, while the $400,000 threshold would remain fixed. The donut hole, therefore, disappears once the annual taxable maximum level reaches $400,000.

This means a worker would be taxed up to the cap [$160,200 in 2023], then would have a reprieve where there are no SS taxes until the worker's income exceeds $400,000. Strangely, at that point taxation would resume. So there's a window of income with no SS taxation, which incidentally would gradually disappear as the cap increases year by year. So that means the upper middle class will indeed pay at some point, despite Dr. Reich's statement.

But even stranger, why is this something He's advocating for? What are the benefits of carving out the exception? And why would this appeal to a voter? If someone makes, say, $300,000, absolutely nothing changes. 

How does carving out an income window for the upper middle class make any sense, especially one that disappears over the course of a few years? Is the upper middle class a constituency the left wants to attract? Is there some special thing about this band of income which makes it off limits? Telling a voter "We are not going to tax you more for a while" is not a winning campaign strategy, and we certainly know that leftists do these things for no other reason than their political appeal.

It makes no sense.

Further, it is worth noting that the Biden plan includes some pretty substantial SS benefit increases. This means that SS beneficiaries are going to eat up all of that additional tax and more. 

This is hardly the solution Dr. Reich thinks it is. But of course, Dr. Reich isn't looking for a solution, he's parroting The Narrative. The Narrative services The Agenda, and The Agenda is to overthrow the system. It's a power strategy. For the Left, everything is about power.)

As it happens, Joe Biden campaigned for the White House on a plan to do exactly this.

What happened to that plan? The budget Biden proposed last month made no mention of any tax increase linked to Social Security (although it did include tax increases on high earners and corporations as a way to extend the solvency of Medicare by 25 years).

I suspect Biden’s plan for Social Security was a casualty of the bare-knuckled politics surrounding both Social Security and the debt ceiling. Biden doesn’t want to give Republicans any opening to debate Social Security in the coming fight over lifting the ceiling.

Hopefully, he’ll revive his plan for Social Security after that brawl. The long-term future of Social Security depends on it.

What do you think?

When "Socialism" destroyed our democracy... Faceborg meme

 Posted by a FB friend:

It seems to us that the vulgar summary dismissal contained in this meme is inappropriate, since it is certainly true that these programs are bankrupting us. 

First, let's define socialism. The classic definition of socialism is the state ownership of  the means of production. There is a three-faced rebuttal offered by the political Left

1. they will deny we have any aspect of socialism because of the classic definition - the government doesn't own the means of production. 
2. they will extoll the virtues of socialism by claiming that socialism is already at work, naming Social Security, the GI Bill, and fire and police departments as expressions of Socialism.
3. while asserting socialism is at work in society, they blame all the economic woes on capitalism. 

We would assert that aspects of socialism are indeed at work in our society, and are in fact the reason we have huge deficits and staggeringly huge economic wealth transfers that have solved nothing. 

Further, government no longer needs to own the means of production to push the socialistic agenda, for controlling the means of production is a defacto ownership. And, there are certain corporations who are happily doing the government's bidding: suppressing speech, censoring debate, and punishing those who don't hold to The Narrative. Thus, government doesn't need to own what it controls.

This goes well beyond the legislative control of the processes of factories and businesses, it includes taxing productivity. Not only does government lay claim to a percentage of a business's income, it does this with each worker as well. This carries an implicit assumption that government has a right to that money. So both a business and a worker's means of production is being taken from them, which as a matter of logic means their money does not belong to them. Therefore, if the result of someone's labor production does not belong to him, the government owns it and simply decides how much it wants to take.

Government has no money of its own, so it must engage in taxation to fund its operations. Those operations which allocate taxed money to beneficiaries (the poor, the retired, the sick) are redistributions, i.e. money taken from one person and given to another. And redistribution is at the heart of socialism.

The Case Against Liberal Compassion - by William Voegeli

This is good stuff, from Imprimis, Hillsdale College.
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WILLIAM VOEGELI is a senior editor of the Claremont Review of Books and a visiting scholar at Claremont McKenna College’s Henry Salvatori Center. After receiving a Ph.D. in political science from Loyola University in Chicago, he served as a program officer for the John M. Olin Foundation. He has written for numerous publications, including the Christian Science Monitor, City Journal, Commentary, First Things, the Los Angeles Times, National Review, and the New Criterion. He is the author of two books, Never Enough: America’s Limitless Welfare State and The Pity Party: A Mean-Spirited Diatribe Against Liberal Compassion.

The following is adapted from a speech delivered at Hillsdale College on October 9, 2014, sponsored by the College’s Van Andel Graduate School of Statesmanship.
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Four years ago I wrote a book about modern American liberalism:Never Enough: America’s Limitless Welfare State. It addressed the fact that America’s welfare state has been growing steadily for almost a century, and is now much bigger than it was at the start of the New Deal in 1932, or at the beginning of the Great Society in 1964. In 2013 the federal government spent $2.279 trillion—$7,200 per American, two-thirds of all federal outlays, and 14 percent of the Gross Domestic Product—on the five big program areas that make up our welfare state: 1. Social Security; 2. All other income support programs, such as disability insurance or unemployment compensation; 3. Medicare; 4. All other health programs, such as Medicaid; and 5. All programs for education, job training, and social services.

That amount has increased steadily, under Democrats and Republicans, during booms and recessions. Adjusted for inflation and population growth, federal welfare state spending was 58 percent larger in 1993 when Bill Clinton became president than it had been 16 years before when Jimmy Carter took the oath of office. By 2009, when Barack Obama was inaugurated, it was 59 percent larger than it had been in 1993. Overall, the outlays were more than two-and-a-half times as large in 2013 as they had been in 1977. The latest Census Bureau data, from 2011, regarding state and local programs for “social services and income maintenance,” show additional spending of $728 billion beyond the federal amount. Thus the total works out to some $3 trillion for all government welfare state expenditures in the U.S., or just under $10,000 per American. That figure does not include the cost, considerable but harder to reckon, of the policies meant to enhance welfare without the government first borrowing or taxing money and then spending it. I refer to laws and regulations that require some citizens to help others directly, such as minimum wages, maximum hours, and mandatory benefits for employees, or rent control for tenants.

All along, while the welfare state was growing constantly, liberals were insisting constantly it wasn’t big enough or growing fast enough. So I wondered, five years ago, whether there is a Platonic ideal when it comes to the size of the welfare state—whether there is a point at which the welfare state has all the money, programs, personnel, and political support it needs, thereby rendering any further additions pointless. The answer, I concluded, is that there is no answer—the welfare state is a permanent work-in-progress, and its liberal advocates believe that however many resources it has, it always needs a great deal more.

The argument of Never Enough was correct as far as it went, but it was incomplete. It offered an answer to two of the journalist’s standard questions: What is the liberal disposition regarding the growth of the welfare state? And How does that outlook affect politics and policy? But it did not answer another question: Why do liberals feel that no matter how much we’re doing through government programs to alleviate and prevent poverty, whatever we are doing is shamefully inadequate?

Today's lesson in Irony - Christian charity and welfare

Posted by FB friend R.E.:

Food for thought... excuse the Pun, I thought it was Punny!

C.C.: A little bias, There are legitimate need for food stamps as well as food banks. You should read up on Social Justice in a Christian context.

R.E.: But government programs are good if they aren't abused or they don't become dependent on them instead of use them while you are down on your luck. The old hand up instead of a hand out.

C.C.: True, There is some abuse, but Republicans seem to want to scrap the safety nets which is BS. They are despicable. Always wanting to balance their spending on the backs of the poor. A loaf of bread costs a rich man the same as a poor man. We always will have people who for whatever reason are unable to work. The solution is not to let them starve.

Me: Forcing some people to pay for others, no matter how needy, is abuse.

M.S.: Rich, would you not help out your neighbor if they were in need? Would you receive help from your neighbor if you were in need? We are all in this (life) together and everyone has the same basic needs, and for some, those needs are not being met. It is our duty as good human beings to assist those less fortunate.

Me: Agreed, M.S.. However, you have described something different. There is nothing compassionate about a government who by the use of force extracts money from some people and redistributes it to others. In fact, that is the opposite of compassion, because the government inserts itself into my compassion transaction, and chooses for me the time, place, and kind of exchange that will occur.

By way of illustration, if a person approaches you on the street and robs you, then gives the money to a poor person, is that compassionate? No, it's theft. If a group of people get together and vote to take money from you and then give it to the poor, is that compassion? No, that is also theft. A majority vote does not make theft moral or legitimate.

M.S.: Although I see your concern, most of the "1%" aren't spreading their wealth in compassionate ways or in sums that people are comfortable with. That is why there is a mandated "donation" in the form of tax. It's based under the assumption that people are greedy, and sadly, most people are.

US Appeals Court Blocks Mississippi Abortion Law

Originally found here. Reproduced here for fair use and discussion purposes. My comments in bold.
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By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS Associated Press

Mississippi's governor and attorney general will have to decide whether to challenge a federal appeals court ruling that is keeping the state's only abortion clinic in business.

A panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals voted 2-1 Tuesday to block a 2012 Mississippi law that requires abortion doctors to obtain admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. (So the law makes a reasonable requirement that doctors performing abortions have medical standing, that is, they're of a reputation and skill that a local hospital would work with them by admitting their clients.)

When Republican Gov. Phil Bryant signed the law, he said he hoped it would end abortion in the state. In defending the law, state attorneys said women with unwanted pregnancies could always travel to other states. But the appellate judges ruled that every state must guarantee constitutional rights, including abortion. (So the court doesn't address the professional status of abortion doctors, it addresses access to abortion. The court said that is is more important to get an abortion than it is to have a highly skilled doctor performing it.

But worse than that is the court's flawed reasoning: Guaranteeing a constitutional right to abortion is the same thing as having the ability to get an abortion without having to go out of state. This is truly tortured logic. This places the state in the position of not only safeguarding the exercise of rights, but ensuring the means exists to exercise them, i.e., removing obstacles from the operation of a business enterprise that provides abortion services.

Let's see how this flies with rights that are actually enumerated in the Constitution. There are no churches in a particular region, so the court rules that building codes must be suspended so that a church facility can be built. The last gun shop in the state is about to close because of onerous gun regulations. The court therefore nullifies all gun control laws.

Can you see how screwy the ruling is?)

Bryant, in a statement late Tuesday, said he was disappointed by the court's ruling.

"This measure is designed to protect the health and safety of women who undergo this potentially dangerous procedure, and physicians who provide abortions should be held to the same standards as physicians who perform other outpatient procedures," Bryant said.

Ten states have adopted similar laws, forcing a growing number of clinics to close. Many hospitals ignore or reject abortion doctors' applications, and won't grant privileges to out-of-state physicians. Both obstacles were encountered by the traveling doctors who staff Mississippi's last open clinic, the Jackson Women's Health Organization. (So actually it is the fault of the hospitals for having high standards for doctors to have admitting privileges. The court should have simply forced hospitals to grant admitting privileges, I guess.)

The ruling from the conservative 5th Circuit was narrowly crafted to address the situation in Mississippi, but it could have implications for the other states with similar laws and dwindling access to abortion, such as Wisconsin and Alabama, whose officials have said women could cross state lines if clinics close, said the center's litigation director, Julie Rikelman.

Attorneys for Mississippi argued that if the state's last clinic closed, women could still get abortions in other states. But the judges said the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision established a constitutional right to abortion for all citizens — and that Mississippi may not shift its obligations to other states. (How can a constitutional right be "established?" It isn't possible. A "constitutional right" is simply a right that was enumerated by the Constitution as it defined the limits of government. Rights are endowed by the Creator as a fact of existence, which makes them unalienable.

The right to abortion is a legal right, not a constitutional right. A future court could easily reverse Roe v. Wade. However, an unalienable right can only be violated, not reversed.)

"Pre-viability, a woman has the constitutional right to end her pregnancy by abortion," wrote judges E. Grady Jolly of Mississippi and Stephen A. Higginson of Louisiana. The law signed by Bryant "effectively extinguishes that right within Mississippi's borders," they said. (Truly astonishing. A right that depends on a business operating in certain geographical borders is not a right at all, it is an operation of commerce by private parties. This makes no sense at all.)

Supporters of admitting-privileges laws say they protect women's health by ensuring that a physician who performs an abortion in a clinic would also be able to treat the patient in a hospital in case of complications.

Opponents say the requirement is unnecessary, since patients in distress are automatically treated in emergency rooms, and that it gives religious-affiliated hospitals veto power over who can work in an abortion clinic and, by extension, whether a clinic can stay open.

"Today's ruling ensures women who have decided to end a pregnancy will continue, for now, to have access to safe, legal care in their home state," Center for Reproductive Rights president Nancy Northup said Tuesday.

A different panel of the 5th Circuit, which handles cases from Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, upheld a 2013 Texas law requiring physicians to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles. In that March ruling, the judges said traveling fewer than 150 miles to obtain an abortion is "not an undue burden."

Even now, women from Iuka, Mississippi, in the state's northeast corner, need to drive 280 miles to reach Jackson.

The clinic remains open, using out-of-state physicians who travel to Mississippi to do abortions several times a month. For years, the clinic has had an agreement with a local physician who will meet a patient at a Jackson hospital in case of complications. Clinic owner Diane Derzis has said such complications are rare. (We know this to be false. There were 1.4 million abortions in North America in 2012, and 6% of them are considered unsafe, as reported by the Guttmacher Institute, which is the data gathering arm of Planned Parenthood. That's 84,000 unsafe abortions EACH YEAR. And 2220 women had abortions in Mississippi in 2011, so 133 were unsafe. That is not "rare" by any measure. 

As an aside, 25% of those abortions are done on Hispanic women, yet they only represent 2.5% of the population. Hmm.)