If Bush had been successful privatizing Social Security would we be bailing it out right now?

[whip]

depends where you invested it.if you purchased bonds you would have been fine.and probably would be making more on them now than a ira.the whole purpose was to do what you want with your own money.if you lost 40% that is a lot less than most.so even you can't trust your own decisions.there are long term investments you can bank on with out someone else running your portfolio.

[Mephistopheles]

All investments have lost that much - you do know that there's no trust fund, right? Just a piece of paper that says they're obligated to give you X dollars. They'll just print those dollars and they'll be worth shit.

[Zaza]

Consider this.........You and your spouse retire at 65 and draw your first paycheck from Social Security. You (or your wife) die. ALL the money you have paid into this over the last 50 years now belongs to the government.

I was (am) all for privatizing social security.

[Roderick B]

Yes, it was far too late for any partial measures. I read (can't remember where) that Social Security was supposed to be fully privatized on January 1, 1965! But sometime in the '50s the congress changed the rules, they did not want to give-up the "free" money. Those Bonds people talk about ,the "IOU"s, are discretionary! The congress can at any time void them.

[G-Man]

Many of the responses to this question just demonstrate the ignorance of the masses. Social security is completely bankrupt and the same people that rant and rave about the injustice of bailing out the banks and wall street (which I too think was asinine) are the SAME people that think it's great to throw trillions of dollars into a dying and bankrupt social security system rather than take a little personal responsibility for themselves and their own lives.

OK ... I've blown off a little steam ... so now ... the basic answer is that Bush only wanted to privatize 2% of social security funds ... Not NEARLY enough ... it should be 75 - 80- 90 or 100%. 401Ks and 403Bs and private retirement accounts may be down right now ... but they will come back as long as you keep on investing and dollar cost averaging. The government has COMPLETELY bankrupted social security and you want to put them in charge of ALL your retirement funds ... Social security is a Ponzi scheme ... it only stays aghmm "viable" by taking new money from people to pay out to earlier investors ... it is NOT sustainable and is heading for disaster.

Do some research on Galveston, Texas, where they opted out of social security in 1981 before the Feds closed the loophole. The people in that system are getting payments 2 - 3 times what social security offers AND they can retire early. Privatizing the system is the only way to save it. Heck ... I'd even go so far as to say they could keep 100% of the money they've already stolen from me .... if I could just check out of the system I'm REQUIRED to be in starting tomorrow. So much for Freedom.

[correrafan]

No, I think he would argue against that, and for the abandonment of the elderly and disabled...

[CAPTAIN BEAR]

Yes, but you will probably get back 20% after the high rollers get through with your money. Reminds me of a high government official in charge of government pensions who used billions under his care for personal investments, even though he made millions, he was found out and arrested.

[crookedbed895]

No. Sorry my friend but you do not understand America. We have 2 economic systems here:

1. Average Joe like you and me live in the capitalistic system where we are self sufficient and pay into the system.

2. Multi-millionaires live in the socialistic system where they receive handouts from the government or pay no tax (or get it back) while we foot the bill.