I’ve been hearing that privatizing Social Security would be a bad thing. Could someone explain to me why that would not be beneficial?

society is so broken, you cant just magically privatize it. you can privatize your own social security though

I don’t understand, what does it mean that society is broken and therefore privatizing social security is bad.

I can’t privatize my own social security. The government collects it from my paycheck, and manages it.

We don't have a free market so financial institutions would gamble with your retirement money as they do now with your savings

How would they gamble with it? Serious.

Wouldn’t privatizing mean they would just manage it, and would have to follow laws like they do with a 401k? Does privatizing mean that the fund would be invested or just collected and managed?

Why would turning socialsecurity(a literal safety net) into a for-profit business accountable to quarterly profits for shareholders be a bad thing?

Are you retarded?

I better be able to opt out of any payments in such a system, that's for damn sure.

If it were privatized the govt couldn't borrow from it whenever they felt like it.

you cant just privatize it and cut all the programs lol. thats being delusional

It wouldn’t be bad. If you remember. GW Bush tried and the democrats blocked him. And some republicans too if I remember correctly.

More like use it for other social programs. LBJ started robbing SS in '69 and leaving IOU's in the fund. Once they learned they could keep robbing it with no repercussions, it was over for SS to some point. My current payment is about 1\4 of what it should have been.

I say we give it to Ukraine

It would be insane. The government demands you make payments into it and then it's managed as a private business with profits for shareholders as the governing principle.

Ohhhhh yes, please sign me up, I greatly wish to be more of a serf to the ruling class than I already am.

Yeah the govt. is terribly incompetent in lots of ways, but just lmao at thinking your retirement would be safe(r) if handled by private companies.


Easy example….your pouring money into a private social security and get plan to retire in 2007. Your quality of life would be way WAY worse just because of poor timing and a sh!tty system.

All it would take is for privitized SS to make some "bad investments" for it to tank decades early

Or have CEO embezzle a ton of the money

Well you can't cut them, but the whole thing could be simplified [UBI] funded from general taxes instead of from taxes on payroll.
^^^
Ponzi scheme piggy bank stuffed full of IOUs.
It could possibly end up creating an even less dynamic market.

How did Vaguard and Aladdin grow so large that they "own everything"?

Mostly "dumb money" plowed into 401Ks that Vanguard controls.


OP when you say privatize what do you mean exactly?

If you mean "self-directed investment" instead of all the money being plowed into US treasuries that would probably be better for individuals who make significant investments and have good sense. It could end up going worse though for others who then most likely would still look to the government to bail them out and save them when they are sick or old and don't have enough funds.

I tend to think that detaching healthcare and the social safety net from employment would be a net good because it would make it easier for people to start and run small businesses if employers weren't saddled with these large extraneous costs. It would probably require higher wages, but the total cost to employers for labor could still be lower.

IMO it was a kind of silly fiction to set up FICA as a separate form of taxation from income tax. Just cover it all with income tax...more clarity, less lying to people. It shouldn't be difficult to determine how much of your income goes to federal and state governments vs. how much you keep.

I kind of like the idea of negative income tax too, as an alternative to a UBI.

It’s a serious question and I’m trying to learn. Do you have a reasoning behind why it would be bad privatize or just insults?

This. I have 0 confidence that the money wouldn't be stolen. I don't trust the gov't but I trust the financial sector of this country even less. I can't envision a scenario where it's privatized and I don't get absolutely fukd because of it. Just look at what's been going on with things like BBBY

1- people would invest in stupid risky things and lose all of their money, then tax payers would have to bail them out anyway.

2- politicians and other scammers cant keep their hands out of the pie now so imagine if we let this happen. The money would be gone faster than it currently is.

To privatize it would be saying you completely trust politicians, investment bankers and financial ignorant people to always make sound, prudent investments. Do you trust all of those people? I damn sure dont.

What I’m not understanding is what does privatizing mean exactly? Does it mean that it’s essentially managed (administered) by a third party? Or does it mean it goes into an account similar to a 401k?

You'll never get control of that money. Even if it did happen there are so many stupid people out there that would lose it all and then the gov't would still have to pay to take care of them. They'd never let that many old people die on the street no matter how badly they fukd up

Myself and others have spelled it out very well. You can't ignore all of that just because I called your question stupid. Sorry, not buying this babe in the woods bullsht.

I can understand a little behind the fear, so as a hedge it probably makes sense for 25% of the money to be like it is now, a mere transfer system where people working right now are directly paying for the retirees of today. But the rest should be available to be controlled by us individually so people who end up relying solely on SS monthly income aren't automatically in poverty.

But then such people are easy to control when elections come around. This is one area I absolutely believe it is an unspoken rule of the Democratic Party to keep people poor, so they'll keep voting for more government control and more welfare state programs. If the elderly poor right now had an extra $2-3K a month income because their mostly private SS account provided such,everything would be different.They'd live longer, vote differently (old people vote more Democrat than they do in their prime working years), more wealth could be left behind, at least a dozen other major differences. But they result inless dependence on government.Plenty of Republicans don't like that idea either, but it's nearly every single Democrat, and not just the political class ones. Gotta keep people in financial chains so they'recontrollable.

Others have addressed the question - somewhat. You on the other hand just went with insults.

That’s fine, I’ll just ignore your posts as they contain no information. Continue on with your anger and animosity.

Explain to me why it would be a good thing op?


Why do conservatives tend to be greedy and stingy?

I never took the position that it is good. I’m not arguing for or against an opinion. I’m open minded and trying to learn.

How about this. You're a liar now too. Probably lying in your OP and all your "questions" along the way.

Is that what a piece of "iron" (see his sig) does?

At this point 18B has been Taken from SS since '69 and not returned. Couple this with compounded interest it should have been earning and you have a staggering amount of money missing from the fund.

There should be a option to opt out and divert 50% of your SS contributions into a personal retirement account like a 401 or Roth. Most of the time those accounts will generate much more income in retirement.

Imagine putting 6.5% into your 401K and then having your employer match it. Then be able to contribute what you already do to your IRA's... We would all retire at 50 rich.... which is exactly why the elites won't let that happen, and it would also cut the gobberment's slush fund so they won't let that happen. Moral of the story: It's not gonna happen.

SS needs to be reframed as not something your supposed to live on but something to supplement other retirement income sources.