Is the media not able to retain 4 facts about current Social Security?

[papau]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45726-2005Jan3.html
http://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/chartbooks/income_aged/2001/iac01.html
http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/trsummary.html
http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=5530&sequence=2
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A45726-2005Jan3?language=printer

On Social Security, why do the cable talking Heads simply assert GOP lies - like Jim Angle's lie on FOX News' 1/6/05 Brit Hume where he repeats Republican spin that Social Security is "heading for an iceberg ... unless significant reforms are undertaken" - rather than mention a few factual talking points like:

A. Social Security will be solvent with no changes at all until 2042, according to the Social Security board of trustees' report, and until 2052, according to the Congressional Budget Office, which contrary to CBS's John Roberts' lies will mean they could continue to pay 73% to 80% - depending on which projection you believe - of the otherwise guaranteed benefit after that insolvent date from the continuing payroll taxes (CBS used words like "Fund Exhausted", and "insolvent" with a screen graphic "2042 Insolvent = 0 benefits", saying workers risk losing all Social Security Benefits if nothing is done).

B. A benefit cut is a benefit cut, and moving from wage indexing to price indexing means a 25.7 percent benefit cut for the typical Social Security recipient in 2042, according to a Washington Post article linked above.

C. Social Security provides at least half of total income for a majority of beneficiaries, and the poorest 20 percent of Americans rely on Social Security for 82 percent of their income on average, according to the Social Security Administration.

D. Even with silly high equity return assumptions on the private accounts occurring at the same time as an unreasonably low GDP growth assumption is hurting the Social Security projection , the Bush plan is not expected to get closer than 94% of the benefit under the current system. Unlike AP writer Leigh Strope who repeated the pull out of the air Bush claim that under the Bush plan, the combined retirement income of SS and the private account "would be expected" to equal or exceed benefits promised to retirees under the current system, perhaps folks could mention the only known numbers comment by chief Social Security actuary Stephen Goss (granted Goss being an "Associate" rather than a "Fellow of the Society of Actuaries" makes him a half qualified Actuary) who told the Washington Post that if such a plan is enacted, total expected retirement income -- including guaranteed Social Security benefits and income from the new private accounts -- "would not match the benefits currently being promised." - the Post reported the example of a middle-income worker retiring in 2052 whose expected combined income would be 6 percent less than that promised under the current system.

[LiberalFighter]

1. Because it is not to their benefit?

Because they hate FDR?

Because they are Republicans?

[papau]

3. One could grow to hate our GOP controlled media.

Perhaps better is

Our not right wing GOP controlled media - they just act that way - whores.

:-)

[blondeatlast]

5. It's made crystal clear in "The Republican Noise Machine."

Above all else, they're lazy and can't do the legwork themselves.

Which is worse, corrupt or lazy?

Fortunately(?), we don't have to choose. We have both.

[EVDebs]

2. Because conservatives want to dismantle the last vestige of the New Deal

With 'medical' related spending making up about 15% of the US's $11 trillion dollar GDP, this means around $1.65 trillion dollars needs to be wiped off of the corporate books in order to remain 'competitive' with the Race to the Bottom--competition with countries without pension/healthcare benefits.

Already being reported, but not in the major media, Businessweek's article "The Benefits Trap"
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_29/b3892001_mz001.htmshows us that:

""An unsavory brew of factors have come together to put stress on the retirement system like never before. First, there's the simple fact that Americans are living longer in retirement, and that costs more. Next come internal corporate issues, including soaring health-care costs and long-term underfunding of pension promises. Perhaps most important, IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY, long-established U.S. companies are competing against younger rivals here and abroad that pay little or nothing toward their workers' retirement, giving the older companies a huge incentive to dump their plans. "The house isn't burning now, but we will have a crisis soon if some of these issues aren't fixed," says Steven A. Kandarian, who ended a two-year stint as the executive director of the PBGC in February. Kandarian is not optimistic about how that crisis might play out, either. "By that time it will be too late to save the system. Then you just play triage.""

Yes, the 'global economy' is making them do it...

So they're wiping out pensions and healthcare from the corporate books and shifting that burden onto...the government ? Hell no, says the Republican party ! We're gonna shift it onto the individual ! And with Bush's $1.85 trillion in tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers, that adds up to about $3.5 trillion dollars being drained from the economy. Besides that, by 2079, the Social Security gap is only $12 trillion. Medicare's deficit by then is expected to be at $62 trillion; and the new drug benefit adds around $17 trillion to that ! (see http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/11/07/BUG0V9N54U1.DTL ).

They are putting the payment responsibility ENTIRELY upon individuals and leaving corporations off the hook for anything. No offense, just telling you the truth.

[papau]

4. Thanks for the SFGATE link and data - the more folks see that the

more - if they have ethics and are honest - will Bush's carve out private accounts go down in flames.

But I have no confidence in the media's ethics or honesty.

I may have to move back to the "old country" - :-)

[EVDebs]

6. Thanks. In order to pay for Bush's tax cuts he's doing Reagan's

strategy from the 1981 tax cuts...which required Social Security to be raided in order to pay for them ! Identical policy, new administration, but some of the same personnel.