You know, it figures that just about the time when I actually find myself agreeing with President Bush for the first time ever in his overwhelming history of horrible ideas, out comes the proverbial pretzel of doubt, just in time to choke those few and far-between strains of common sense back down into the bowels of political ignorance. So much for the afterglow…
I’ve always been a proponent of privatized social security for as long as I can remember, the topic having been kicked up by those crazy liberals every now and again whenever someone was smart enough to do the math and realize that the current system was bound for failure. I sighed as the proposition was shot down again and again by folks who believed that the old system was good enough for their parents, and thus good enough for them too, despite the fact that generational swelling seemed to make it common sense that more children to eventually collect required even more contributions by their own children, but alas, a pyramid scheme gone wrong, we’ve done little to correct the problem thus far and only managed to work our nation deeper and deeper into debt.
I guess when you’re the ones physically making the money yourselves, such liabilities are little more than red numbers on an endless piece of paper…
Needless to say, I have very little faith in our existing social security program and foresee it potentially even running out by my father’s time, much less my own, so I very early on came to the conclusion that funding my retirement was going to be a task met by me and me alone. It’s too bad, really, when I take a look at all of the benefits given to the elderly and retired persons in this day and age because anyone on the outside would look at the United States of America like we’ve really got things together, all the while on the inside we’re more like that family down the block that’s got all of the latest toys and gadgets, but only because underneath they’re horrendously in debt and will likely end up either divorced or in the poor house in a matter of years. Why does it have to be this way?
When it all comes down to it, I can appreciate a private system for social security because at the end of the day, I alone want to be the one responsible for my future – for better or for worse. While still a good forty years away, I understand that one needs to prepare for retirement as early as possible and, for lack of a better answer, I don’t feel comfortable relying on my government for this when to this day, they’ve grown accustomed to borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. It’s a downward spiral that doesn’t have to be there, and yet so many people are making such a big fuss about it…primarily because they’re afraid of how it will impact their checks – them being the next two generations prior to my own. Of course, it’s always easier to just sit around and bitch than it is to actually get your hands dirty and fix something, but guess what – I think they owe it to their children to make this one right…
And it’s a simple fix, if you ask me – a two part system where we all start contributing to private accounts for ourselves right this very second, and then also continue to contribute to the existing fund for current and future retirees who retired before the new system came to be. We might end up paying a little more money for a while, or the extra funds could come from some other entirely-over-bloated government project, but like I said, some times you have to get your hands dirty in order to fix a situation like this. Even farther down the road, maybe it would be a wise investment to start newborns out right with a contribution to their own accounts, years before they even enter the workforce – whatever it takes to make the numbers stand on their own and get us out of this mess!
But regardless, it doesn’t take a mathematician to realize that the current system doesn’t work and will continue not working just as long as opposing forces strive to patch it up with one hair-brained tactic after another. Maybe your system worked great on paper fifty years ago when it was traditional for families to have six or eight children, building a great foundation for your social security pyramid, but guess what? I’m not having that many kids to ensure that the money will be there when I retire – it’s time to go another direction.
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