A Proposed Solution For Social Security Insolvency

So I guess you'll be voting for leadfoot as he has the whole thing figured out.

That would be Gary Johnson who I will 'throw my vote away' on come November. I doubt he will endorse my solution, that is far from a 'less government' idea that the Libertarian party usually goes for.

I'm playing devils advocate with this idea. Liberals have got to face the fact that we really cannot pay for SS, Medicare, Medicade, Food stamps, AFDC, 'earned income credit' and the vast array of other programs for the poor by making the rich pay for it. Either we face the fact that these are societal obligations and we have to find a more efficient way of paying for these obligations, if that's what they are. Taxing the rich will not add up math wise and does not pass the fairness smell test.

Now I've got ya, dude. You don't want to fix it. You just want it to be tinkered with, according to people of the ilk of Johnson.

Gary Johnson:
Government-managed healthcare is insanity. (Aug 2012)
Block grant Medicare; carte blanche to the states. (Aug 2011)
ObamaCare is unconstitutional; so is Bush's Medicare Rx plan. (Aug 2011)
Salud!: managed care for Medicaid recipients. (Jul 2011)
1999: vetoed 12-cent-a-pack cigarette tax hike. (Jul 2011)
Cut Medicare/Medicaid by 43%, as part of $1.675 trillion cut. (May 2011)
Repeal ObamaCare & failed Medicare prescription drug benefit. (May 2011)
No federal pre-emption of employee health plan regulation. (Oct 2001)

Governments don't create jobs--businesses do. (Feb 2012)
Oppose NLRB recent actions against Boeing in SC. (Jul 2011)
1999: Vetoed raising minimum wage from $4.25/hour to $5.65. (Jul 2011)
Long unemployment benefits postpones dealing with problem. (May 2011)

I view government in the same way as philosopher Ayn Rand. (Aug 2012)

Tea Party insures that Republicans are part of the solution. (Jul 2011)

Raise the retirement age to 70 or 72. (Aug 2012)
A portion of Social Security ought to be privatized. (Aug 2012)
Replace the payroll tax with FairTax. (Feb 2012)
Raise the retirement age; plus means testing. (Aug 2011)
Reform all entitlements, including Social Security. (Jul 2011)
Open to personal accounts for Social Security. (Jul 2011)
Change escalator from wage-based to inflation-based. (May 2011)
Maintain long-term solvency of Social Security and Medicare. (Aug 2001)

23% national sales tax while eliminating the IRS. (May 2012)

Opposes Net Neutrality; no government regulation of Internet. (Jul 2011)
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No. No Gary Johnson for me.

I just reread everything on this thread, point out to me what evidence you have.

I see your opinion, and what you think/hope would happen, but that's it.

Again? I'll repeat it a third time:

This is real world, actual history. If you are saying this is invalid evidence, show why.

We didn't print money to pay for "several wars", we borrowed it with a promise to pay it back. That doesn't cause inflation. Just deciding to print more money devalues the currency already out there. If there is 10 trillion in circulation and we print another trillion, each dollar is now worth just 91 cents and there is an instant 9% inflation. Additionally, all the debt that the government owes is instantly reduced in value. People who lend the US money (mostly a lot of Americans) are not going to be pleased with that policy and will move future investments elsewhere driving up the cost of borrowing. Finally, there is no such thing as a "limited application". Money is fungible so printed money for any reason becomes printed money for every reason.

What engineer said.

If you disagree, show us where money was "just printed" for the purposes you state, and not borrowed. That burden is on you, not me or anyone else.

I'm not so sure that investors will invest in other countries, because the US economy is still the strongest in the world. Where will they move their investments to? China?

If I loan you money in dollars and then you devalue the dollar, I just lost some of my principle. It's one thing to pay a low interest rate, it's another to devalue my principle. It gets people's attention pretty fast. The US can pay very low interest rates because of the perceived safety of the investment. When that perception is gone, look out.

I don't have any power to value or devalue the dollar. I live with many things I cannot control. For instance, my wife worries about the price of fuel. I don't; it's something we all have to live with, and there's nothing I can do to control its price.
On the other hand, the mega lotto is over $400 million; I'm thinking of buying a ticket or two.

I'm the one that controls the mega lotto numbers ci. I'll see what I can do for you.

I'll give a reward after I win.

In the context of the national budget, there is no difference between 'borrowing money' and printing it. We have not paid down the national debt since Andrew Jackson. It has only increased since that time and no one has devalued our currency because of that.

The economy is not a zero sum game. Wealth (money) is being created all the time. That is the real reason people and nations have not rejected our credit. Take a look at Japan if you think printing money does not happen. No one is talking about writing them off even though they have printed money way beyond what they should have. The world has even bailed poor Greece out, one of the worst 'money printers'.

There's a big difference between borrowing and printing money. Printing money has only one effect; inflation. If there's more money circulating than products and services, it results in inflation.

If you never pay the money you borrowed back, or just borrow more money to pay back a loan plus interest, IT'S PRINTING MONEY.

And yes, it has created inflation. Hadn't you noticed?

It hasn't been disastrous for one reason. We HAVE managed to make enough goods and services to make up for the money printed by the government.

Just don't pretend we aren't printing money. We are and have been since Andrew Jackson was president.

No, it's not. Have you ever studied macroeconomics?

Simple negation is not an argument.

Explain why borrowing more money to pay off old loans + interest continuously is not 'printing money'. And that is the polite term.

I notice that Japanese bonds are now returning a negative return. Does not that suggest that the Yen is being considered an extremely stable currency?

Read this where it is simply explained:

Ok, so you're the government and you owe a bunch of money to people, companies and other governments. But you don't have any money that you can use to pay them back. So you "print" a trillion or two. Governments don't actually print money. They just create it at a computer screen.

Ok the people you owe money to are not stupid. They know you just printed a bunch of money. They know that the "pool" of money has just been diluted by a this new money. Net result is that the value of the money just goes down. This results in prices rising - after all the value of the money has just be reduced. Bottom line: inflation rises.

Zimbabwe has been printing money for years. They now have trillion dollar bank notes.

So, they next big question is why does the USA not have huge inflation? After all it has "printed" large amounts of money. The answer is because the new printed money is used to immediately buy USA treasury and USA corporate bonds from the USA economy. So, with one hand they "print" money, and then immediately remove the equivalent amount of money from the available "pool" of money. That way the "pool" does not get larger and therefore USA does not suffer inflation. I have just explained in very simplistic terms Quantitative Easing.

(some economics whizz)

There is a very basic fallicy in your story. One so blatant I can't believe you wrote it down.

'They' ( the government) do not buy treasury bonds. They only sell them. The bonds are bought mainly by fat cats that have more money than they know what to do with. So they put it in something they think is safe and still increases their vast pile of money with the interest earned.

What 'they' actually do with the printed money is send it to SS recipients, Medicare and Medicade providers, welfare recipients, makers of guns and rockets, etc. who then spend that money directly into the economy, thus increasing the money supply.