First U.S. baby boomer applies for Social Security

[Flabbergasted]

Source: Reuters

First U.S. baby boomer applies for Social Security
Mon Oct 15, 2007 5:17pm EDT

By Donna Smith

WASHINGTON, Oct 15 (Reuters) - Retired school teacher Kathleen Casey-Kirschling on Monday became the first ripple in a "silver tsunami" of retiring baby boomers applying for pension benefits that threatens to overwhelm U.S. government finances.

Casey-Kirschling was born one second after midnight on Jan. 1, 1946, and will receive her first Social Security check in February 2008 as the first wave of baby boomers turns 62 next year and becomes eligible for early retirement benefits.

Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue said the agency is bracing for some 80 million Americans to apply for retirement benefits over the next two decades.

"We are already feeling enormous pressure from baby boomers being in their peak disability years and now we're preparing for so many of them to file for retirement," Astrue said at a press conference with Casey-Kirschling.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN15383509

[Bjornsdotter]

1. Crap

...well it's all downhill from here, luckily I'm one of the younger boomers. :evilgrin:

[Warren Stupidity]

6. Us younger boomers are the truly fucked.

We've gotten the ass end of the deal since the start.

[Stuckinthebush]

36. Hello!?

What about us Gen Xers?

Damn boomers. ;)

[Warren Stupidity]

39. Wait a second.

It is all about us. You guys don't even count.

[Stuckinthebush]

40. Oh, nevermind...carry on!

:D

My sister was born in 64 at the end of the boomer cycle, and I was born eighteen months later in 66 at the beginning of the X cycle. I kid her that her generation is going to screw it up for us young gen xers. LOL - I'm more boom oriented than X oriented.

[noonwitch]

47. Not if we start buying up all the nursing homes and senior programs

Then, we can profit enough from their social security to provide for our own!

[MrMickeysMom]

49. I don't think so...

All we have to do is demand Congress re-adjust the level of income taxes as they were around Eisenhower off top wage earners. We would more than manage SS benefits.

The rest of what we should do as "younger baby boomers" (I was born in 53, so I"m in the middle) is take this national health plan of ours (you do think we should have one, don't you?) and start educating ourselves about taking our personal health responsibly.

That's what I think we should do.

Don't get discouraged.

[papau]

24. there is no problem - the SS promise will be met - no one is bracing for anything other than tax

rates on the rich being raised to pay back those bonds that SS holds from when it gave the money to finance tax cuts for the rich.

Of course the GOP will say the sky will fall if the rich are forced to payback those bonds - can't raise taxes on the rich, now can we.

There is likely going to be an increase in the retirement age for full benefits so as to reflect the increased lifespan - most likely from Reagan's age 67 to 70 over 36 years beginning in 2030 - meaning retires at age 62 will get less.

And if I and others can make it happen, there could be a removal of the wage cap on payroll taxes with the 2$ of pay released being used to reduce the employees contribution rate from the current 6.2% to 4.2%

Listen to the actuaries and read the actuaries report to the Trustees (disclosure note - I am an actuary) - do not listen to the axe to grind types that the mass media drag in front of the camera - at least the actuaries are under a code of conduct to not mislead you.

[Bjornsdotter]

28. Thank-you

....so much for your very thoughtful response.

You have given me a lot of hope. :hug:

:toast:

[papau]

43. :-)

[ProudDad]

30. Entirely correct, my friend

:hi:

[papau]

42. :-)

[ProudDad]

2. Double-crap

raise the cap...

Problem solved...

[Flabbergasted]

3. You must not be a babyboomer? nt

[ProudDad]

9. Raise the cap

Problem solved...

I'm barely "pre-boomer" although my "retirement age" fucked up my payment rate 'cause I got lumped in with the boomers.

[sandyd921]

8. Yep it's an easy fix

despite the republiCONS' scare tactics about the imminent demise of SS. Maybe we'll get some action on raising the cap with a Democratic landslide in "08?

[ProudDad]

10. I'd also tax all transactions on the stock markets too...

They're Ponzi schemes and should be made to pay for the real retirement program...

[Justitia]

4. Bush appointee on the job for a mere 8 months, already scaring everybody

Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue was appointed to the job in February.
He's previously worked for Reagan and Poppy Bush.
This dude is the official fox in charge of the hen house.
Doncha love his phrasing? "We are already feeling enormous pressure from baby boomers being in their peak disability years and now we're preparing for so many of them to file for retirement," Astrue said at a press conference with Casey-Kirschling.

I love when repugs are put in charge of Soc Sec and the only thing they are appointed to do is DESTROY IT and the public perception of it.

He backpeddles a bit later on, but you get the idea....

[Warren Stupidity]

5. Dike about to break. Volunteers for early exit program needed.

Oh how they are going to have to get the Bullshit Machine working 25/8 to convince an entire generation to vote against keeping their own starvation level pensions fully funded. But from what I've seen of the late phase of my glorious (we will change the world) generation, they will manage to accomplish that seemingly impossible task.

Trust Fund IOUs? Say what?

[JVS]

7. Exit program? Like what, operation dog-food?

[Warren Stupidity]

13. I was thinking more like Quietus from 'Children of Men'. nt.

[ProudDad]

31. I thought you were talking about

Soylent Green (tm)...



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soylent_Green

[Warren Stupidity]

33. Well that would be about the same thing.

I guess the point is, is there any reason at all to think that the sick fucks running the show will not hesitate to eliminate us to save them from having to make good on the pension payments we've made for 40 odd years? Have they ever shied away from the odious as a solution to whatever obstacle is in their way?

[jedr]

11. they took money from me and my employer since I was 16;

I am now 60..They spent the money and now they want to tell me that for some reason I don't deserve what they forced me to take part in because for some unknown reason we baby boomer's screwed up everything by being born. Get those billionaires that Bush has created to kick in a little more , or the sh*t is going to fly......:nuke: On edit: 6 yrs ago SS was fully funded till 2050 . If the cap was adjusted only to meet inflation the problem would be solved..Why this administration takes glee in screwing the citizens of our country at every turn is beyond me..Destroying the middle class will destroy this country. It doesn't take much to figure that out!

[pokercat999]

38. That my friend is their sick goal.

They want to create a country where there are only the super rich and their slaves.

[sandyd921]

12. Not all of us baby boomers are gonna be able to retire at 62

or even 66. Hey, at age 60 I'm still paying off student loans from Grad School!

[Spinzonner]

14. Liberal Immigration policies

Get more people paying into the system

[Warren Stupidity]

19. shhhh don't spoil the xenophobes fun. nt.

[bluestateguy]

15. Raise the income cap on FICA taxes: problem solved

This is not rocket science requiring some mystifyingly complex "privatization" scheme drawn up by the pretend scholars at the American Enterprise Institute.

[papau]

25. True - indeed more than solved - we could get a tax rate cut! :-)

[Maestro]

16. There will be no SS for me nor my kids.

But yet we can spend trillions in Iraq! :banghead:

[ProudDad]

17. Do not despair

read post #9 (and some others)...

If we could really get power we could raise the tax rate on millionaires to about 90% again...to pay off their fucking profitable war....

[Maestro]

20. Thanks.

I'd love to see that happen.

[cyberpj]

18. Yeah, too bad so many President's raided the SS funds for so many years.

From what I understand Social Security would have been fine if they'd kept their hands out of the cookie jar.

[Habibi]

21. Al promised to protect those funds for us.

And people laughed at him.

[bronxiteforever]

22. You got that right!

Gore had a plan in 2000 that made sense-the bastard journalists owe him and us an apology

[papau]

26. There has been no "raid" on SS - there has been massive overspending and exzcessive tax cuts that

produced 500+ billion of deficit increase every year that our media has not reported - reporting instead the "budget" deficit which uses Social Security surpluses to hide the massive deficit.

The SS system holds government bonds that it will begin to cash in in 2017.

That is the fear - that is the only GOP fear - because to cash those bonds in the rich will have their tax rates raised so as to get the money to repay the bonds - in effect the rich have to repay those Bush tax cuts that we couldn't have afforded without the SS surplus. The rich will be repaying the loan they took out from SS so they could have the tax cut for the rich.

[ProudDad]

32. That's Rich!!!

"The rich will be repaying the loan they took out from SS so they could have the tax cut for the rich."

I love it!!! :rofl:

[FREEWILL56]

37. Somehow I don't believe they'll be made to pay it.

[mbperrin]

41. 80 million boomers, and they can all vote.

Social Security withholding was doubled in Raygun's term. Half went to pay for our parents' social security, the other half to the trust fund for us. Those funds are government bonds, and they will simply have to be redeemed to pay us, or 80 million voters (can you say cantankerous, annoyed, savvy, dangerous?) will do whatever they must, including vote, to collect our own money. I began paying in 1966, and no one can now convince me I did not. Nor will I accept "the dog ate my social security."

[papau]

44. that is also my fear n/t

n/t

[Lasher]

52. You and I think exactly alike about SS

The most important thing that needs to be done right now about Social Security is nothing at all. If any changes whatsoever are needed they should be made by the next administration, not this one.

Every single thing Junior and his cronies are saying and doing is designed to avert their 'chrisis' for the rich: paying off the trust fund treasury bonds, starting in 2017. This is morally reprehensible, particularly when you consider the retroactive tax holiday, for the rich only, that would extend all the way back to Saint Ronnie's day.

[splat]

23. Boomer have paid money into SS all their lives

Now everybody's upset that it's their turn to collect now?

Fifty years ago, social security was supposed to be broken by 1990.

Republicans hated FDR for instituting such "socialism." Telling you it's broken and won't be there for YOU is an attempt to get you to give it up.

[papau]

27. very True n/t

n/t

[gratuitous]

29. We've overstuffed Social Security since 1982

Alan Greenspan said we needed to start funding the baby boomers, and FICA taxes went up, up, up on working folks. We've been overpaying this fund by mega-billions in anticipation of the pig in the python (baby boom generation) finally making it to retirement. Of course, the Republicans have plundered the fund to give it away to the overrich in tax cuts, but the full faith and credit of the United States backs that paper.

Social Security is totally solvent, and is slated to remain so for the next 75 years at least, which should cover the retirements of just about everyone here. The only way Social Security goes insolvent is if the U.S. defaults, and then a monthly retirement check is going to be the least of anyone's worries.

However, the object lesson of Social Security easily translates to a single payer system of health insurance for everyone. Yes, young people often don't think about buying health insurance for themselves. They're healthy and barring an horrible accident or a debilitating disease, they're pretty well set for 20 years or so. As young people pass into their 40s, 50s and 60s, they can continue to pay the same premium they've always paid, and newer workers (who are less likely to need big access to medical services) can pay a slightly higher premium, indexed to inflation. Just as young people are unlikely to start saving for retirement, Social Security payroll taxes do that for them; the same way they could begin paying for single payer health care when they're in peak health so that as they age, they can take advantage of a system that they themselves will build up through their own contributions.

Or does that make it too simple, and therefore unamerican (or at least unrepublican)?

[ProudDad]

34. Beautifully done...

Mind if I clip your explanation for inclusion in my occasional HR676 post?

[gratuitous]

45. Clip away

File off the serial numbers and claim it for your own, if you like. Get the information out any way you can; everything in my post has been cribbed from places like Eschaton and Daily Kos (though I admit that the analog to single payer health occurred to me as I was composing).

[roamer65]

35. I think I hear a helicopter...wait here comes Ben!

:evilgrin:

[Massachusetts]

46. Paul Krugman maintains SS is in good shape, so don't be fooled

Its MEDICARE/MEDICAID WHERE THE PROBLEM WILL BE.

and Don't worry you Youngsters out there, I'm working till I drop the show is to much fun to leave (tanning on a beach or playing golf everday gets old fast).

As you get older its amusing to watch the "young pups" forge ahead with unshakable confidence (even though you're warned sometimes about the brick wall just around the corner), arggghhhh...the hell with that old fart he doesn't even remember where his cubical is, ......Young Pup says: "man the torpedo's full speed ahead and take no prisoners"....BOOM!
Cut to Old Fart: Old fart sits back and smiles (doesn't even say I told ya so), finds his cube and emails young pup "shake it off, you'll get it the next time, lets grab a beer after work"....History always repeats.

Prediction:
Most "Baby boomers" will stay active in the work force, opting for 3 or 4 day working weeks.

[superconnected]

48. And now we find out that... Pyramid schemes don't work.

Gee who'd have thought!

We do have enough TAXES to pay the baby boomers what they deserve since they did pay into social security. And we better fucking give them the tax money, instead of listen to bushs song and dance about NOT paying them.

If we cap bush's spending spree, it won't be such a problem.

After all, nearly all social programs are gone now as well as affordable gov college loans and grants including the pell. We aren't exactly spending all that money we used to be on our own welfare anymore, it's all diverted to collusive contracts. Cut those fucking contracts and viola we can do for ourselves.

I'm not a baby boomer but I see where this certianly does affect me now. The decision at this cross road will carry on for 25+ years.

Time to claim responsiblity and pay up and expect to take responsiblity for the working elderly (and all elderly) from here forward.

Will fuck face (I mean george bush) do the right thing? likely not. Fuck face is evil and his supporters are too stupid to support their own interest.

The people need to rise and yell and oust the criminal or it will be ALL of us who get cut off in old age.

That means getting rid of corporate whores like Pelosi and Clinton and putting in people that really will support us. With the wolves in the hen house now, we cannot stop the Republican hate/theft machine.

We HAVE to take back our taxes. Or we die now.

[Solar_Power]

50. Increase the SS limit to $1 million (from current $97K)

That will solve the problem for 275 years.

[slackmaster]

51. That's about the size of it

It seems very odd to me that income in excess of $97K is exempt from that tax.

One year back in the '80s I actually passed the limit (which was much lower) and was very surprised to see a boost in my take-home pay late in the year.