Yes, it is. Younger people are in favor of private accounts.
Sure, he can. Of course, it’s good to see the fine print on something to know that you support it. But, one can be in favor of a general idea before the details are hammered out.
You’d be in favor of a universal health care plan, right? Most liberals don’t need to know any more specifics than that to know that they are in favor of UHC as a concept.
The same is true of people who are financially savvy and private accounts. I want one. Almost anything would be better than the current ponzi scheme that I’m forced to participate in. So, yes, I’m in favor of a plan that involves private accounts. Just about anything would be better than what we have now. I’m curious to see the details, but I already know I’ll probably like whatever is proposed.
See post # 26. Here’s a link to the actual poll with question wording.
Also, here are some more polls that show clearly there is a huge amount of support from young people for private accounts. (These are from Zogby). 80% of 18-29 year olds prefer private accounts to the existing system. 70% of 30-49 year olds do.
Huh? I said “one can be in favor of a general idea before the details are hammered out.” and you respond that “the details are the plan”. Is that supposed to mean something?
I love this argument! You’ve made a point. I disagree with you. Now you say that I must not be paying attention! It’s about the cleanest way to demonstrate that you are losing the argument. Thank you.
The only polls listed there that have responses broken down by age are from Fox News. :rolleyes:
Also, here are some more polls that show clearly there is a huge amount of support from young people for private accounts. (These are from Zogby).
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And date from 1999 :rolleyes: . The subject has been discussed a bit since then, hasn’t it? People have thought about it a bit, haven’t they? Numbers like this:
are way obsolete, or else there’d be some public support even now, wouldn’t there?
It means you’re warming up for this next claim:
No, it means that you have had the definition of “Ponzi scheme” explained to you in enough detail that you know it is not an accurate description of Social Security. You have not rebutted that at all, except to say “I disagree with you”. You know better, but persist in claiming a point that you know enough not to be true. Would you prefer I simply call you a liar?
The system can only kept operational by subsequent investors. There are no profits, and no real business. The short term returns offered to the initial investors were high, but now more and more money is needed from new investors (workers) to keep the system from collapse.
Social security is a ponzi scheme. The fact that you like the program doesn’t make it stop being a ponzi scheme. Calling people who can see the simply truth of this a liar just makes you look foolish.
What’s wrong with Fox News? They are the only major media oulet not biased to the left, and so you can just dismiss polls done by them? The poll was run by Zogby. Are they worthy of just dismissing out of hand because the poll was for Fox?
I didn’t notice the date on the other poll. Here are some more, just from doing a quick google search:
In another thread, I spelled out exactly how social security is a ponzi scheme. You lost the debate, mostly because of your insistence that ponzi schemes require the number of entrants doubling every generation. This isn’t true, and you were able to provide no cite backing it up.
In any case, clearly I did rebut it. Here is [url=http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=309286&page=1&pp=50]the thread[/urll]. You quoted me where I spell out exactly how social security is a ponzi scheme.
So, your accusation now that I haven’t rebutted that at all except to say “I disagree with you” is a lie.
Repeating that will not make that asinine assertion true.
News to me, has any republican seriously proposed that SS is a fraud and attempted to pass a law since this is so?
So now SS is for investing? more news to me. only if you are lucky and do live long after retirement that I can see SS to be considered that.
And looking at what the real Ponzi did, the profit for his investors had virtually no limits and gave investors returns higher than 50%. and then the whole thing collapsed in a few years, Can you show where SS does this?
This IMO describes that I can not take anything of what you say seriously. it is not **ElvisL1ves ** who is looking worse here.
Politicians have to be careful what they say. Social Security is a dangerous political subject. The language from politicians is reserved for good reason. This doesn’t mean Social Security isn’t a fraud the way that it’s set up now.
People are forced to pay in their whole lives, then when they die their families don’t get the money back. They get no compounding interest generated on their money except the small amount left over after paying existing retirees. They pay into a system where they have no control over the way their money is invested. If somebody made a program like this in the private sector than it would probably be prosecutable as fraud, especially if they made themselves the first retiree.
Social Security is definitely an investment. People pay in expecting that some day they will get paid back from the system. This is an investment. It’s also part insurance, where they pay in knowing that if something bad happens then they will get paid out. So, it’s both. But, it’s primarily an investment.
So, in order to be a ponzi scheme, the program in question must behave exactly like Ponzi’s original scheme? Bullshit. They come in all shapes and sizes. A ponzi scheme could burn itself out in a matter of hours on the internet or over the course of generations like Social Security. Either way, it is what it is.
Don’t kid yourself. The Party leadership has seriously offended the (already somewhat disaffected) small-government component of its base, both philosophically (this intervention is about this unltimate in nanny statism) and in cynically pragmatic terms (“they can stay in town all weekend for this, but they can’t do jack to get my taxes down to an acceptable level…”).
GIGO, I could have told you you’d be wasting your time, but thanks anyway.
Debaser, you have yet to support your assertion that SS must necessarily burn out, like a Ponzi scheme (in any form) must, hence its fraudulence. It’s been seven decades already, and even if the machine isn’t tuned up for a while it won’t even slow down for another four. Unless you’re seriously claiming that it cannot be fixed and is inherently fraudulent, you are indeed lying. Are you finally willing to either make that claim or back off?
SS is not an “investment” but a transfer tax, btw, of course - you’re either lying about that too or are simply being stubborn. Recipients don’t “get their money back” and never did. They get tax money paid by those still working.
You might go back and actually read all of it, then. I did try to explain to you what a Ponzi (aka pyramid) scheme is, and therefore why it is doomed to collapse in very little time, but you just don’t want to find out, do you?
Maybe. I’m a small government conservative member of that base, and it didn’t offend me. I’m also an atheist who thought they were wrong on that issue. I disagreed with them, but it didn’t offend me. The new prescription drug plan would be much more offensive to those same people, and that didn’t seem to diminish them at the polls last November.
(I do think it will burn out eventually, but this isn’t a requirement of a Ponzi Scheme. If I created a Ponzi scheme exactly like the original, would it cease beinga ponzi scheme simply if I paid back $.01 to every person defrauded?)
What finally? You’re trying to make it sound like I’m avoiding something, but that is not the case.
Social security is a bad deal. I want out. It doesn’t take advantage of compounding interest and doesn’t give me control over my own money. I don’t get to pass it on as inheritance, and I don’t have any say in how it’s used or invested. These problems are inherent to the existing system. Whether it’s fixed, scrapped altogether, or replaced by another program, or altered, or changed, I don’t care. I just want out of the system the way it works now. I don’t care what word you want to use.
Wel that’s exactly what’s inherently wrong with the existing program. Social Security is still an investment, though. Money is going in with the expectation that money will come back later.
When you buy stocks, you don’t “get your money back” either. Your money gets spent by the seller. Later when you sell, you get different money from another buyer. Are stocks not an “investment”, either then?
Yes, you kept on insisting that a ponzi scheme requires each generation to double. This is not the case, and your own cite said it wasn’t. Everyone in the thread realized this except for you.
BTW, it’s funny that you can clearly lose an argument and later accuse me of lying simply for continuing to disagree with the silly premise that you were unable to prove.
I really wish some people on the SDMB were able to grasp the concept that “people who disagree with me” doesn’t automatically = “liars”. The fact that you are wrong in this particular case and I’m right makes it even more pathetic. But even if you were correct in this instance, you would still be out of line for insisting that everyone who disagrees with you is a liar.
Not to finely parse words, but that would be more of a “speculation”, yes? In the dim and distant past, investing in stocks meant primarily investing in the company, with an eye towards a share of the profits. Nowadays, that aspect of “investing” appears to have entirely vanished, replaced with “speculating” that the price of the stock will rise for resale.
This principle seems to be the very foundation of GeeDubya’s (Praise the Leader!) scheme: the price of stocks will continue to rise at a healthy and predictable rate. NB: “predictable” in this sense beyond merely “plausible”, but with a certainty. This is “the calm confidence of a Methodist with four aces.” It is as near a certainty as can be defined, there are no educated opinions of an opposite view that we are obliged to consider. But, of course, there are.
Our Leader does not suffer the pangs of doubt, he is not, in the deathless words of Condi Rice, “a fact checker”. Having done such a splendid job on the international front, he turns his limitless intelligence on domestic issues.
He is a firm and resolute leader. But so was Custer.
Nonsense. By your extraordinarily broad definition of Ponzi schemes, most insurance plans qualify. Life insurance certainly involves a system in which investors put money in, but don’t get their money back, and in which no actual business takes place, and in which many investors don’t get their money back. Medical insurance is even more of a bad deal for most investors.
Except that these are not investment plans (which are designed to make money): they’re insurance plans (which are designed to protect against lean times). Social security is more like an insurance plan than an investment plan.
As for polling numbers, check out this site. Other than Fox’s numbers, I’m finding ABC’s:
(I don’t know how to put tables in quote marks; search for that text if you want the full results).
They find the 18-29 group opposes Bush’s proposals 49-40; the 30-39 group opposes Bush’s proposals 50-44; and it goes downhill for Bush from there.
Looking over all the polls on that page, Fox’s numbers are consistently different from everyone else’s numbers, and consistently show far more support for Bush’s plans than do anyone else’s polls. Hmm.
So, according to you guys, Social Security and Stocks aren’t investments? What would actually qualify as an “investment” then? These threads are annoying because I find that most people opposed to social security reform simply have no clue about the basics of finance. If you don’t even understand basic terms, then how can you know what’s best for the discussion? It’s like when you see gun control advocates who don’t know the difference between a revolver and a shotgun.
Your cite is putting Bush’s name in the question! This makes it more a question of how much the reader likes Bush than it does a question of Social Security. A person might hate Bush, but still want private accounts.