Social Security Round-Up for 2/28
FactCheck.org, a project of the Annenburg Public Policy Center, wrongly attacked a number of prominent Democrats for correctly pointing out that Social Security does not contribute to the deficit. The people attacked, included New York Senator Charles Schumer, Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin, and President Obama’s Budget Director Jacob Lew, who had all correctly pointed out that Social Security does not contribute to the budget deficit.
This point should be pretty straightforward. Under the law, Social Security is financed by a designated tax, the 12.4 percent payroll that workers pay on their first $107,000 of income each year. The money raised through this tax is used to pay benefits. Any surplus is used to buy U.S. government bonds. All funding for the program comes either from this tax or from the bonds held by the program’s trust fund. (The Social Security system is also is credited with a portion of the income tax paid on Social Security benefits.)
Social Security is prohibited from spending any money beyond what it has in its trust fund. This means that it cannot lawfully contribute to the federal budget deficit, since every penny that it pays out must have come from taxes raised through the program or the interest garnered from the bonds held by the trust fund.
*Robert J. Elisberg: The Republican Attention Deficit Disorder:
Before people can have a rational discussion, they have to agree on certain basic facts. And that’s one of them.
Republicans in Congress do not care about the budget deficit.
Yes, I know there’s going to be a lot of squealing now. How that’s not true at all, how only Republicans care about fiscal responsibility. How this is just typical liberal blather. So, as a public service, there, it’s been said.
But of course, what is said out of one side of the mouth doesn’t mean it matches the reality and facts of the other side. And just because Republicans, conservatives and members of the “Tea Party” corporations have been convinced by what they’ve been fed, that doesn’t make it true either. The reality remains:
Republicans in Congress do not care about the budget deficit.
Consider reality…
At an elegantly catered tea-time roundtable fête with reporters Wednesday afternoon, likely Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said public sector unions ought to be entirely eliminated, or hamstrung to limit worker benefits and influence over elected officials. During the same session, though, he admitted that a life of public service, and running for public office, has left him without a sizable nest egg. In fact, he acknowledged that he wants to delay a final decision about the presidential campaign so he can put away more of the big-time private sector money he’s currently making.
*Milbank Misses on the “Hard Truths” About Social Security « Social Security Media Watch Project:
In his “Washington Sketch,” Dana Milbank suggested that New Jersey governor Chris Christie “tells ugly truths.” One “truth” he points to is Christie’s claim that “You’re going to have to raise the retirement age for Social Security.” For Milbank, Christie’s willingness to state this claim in a straightforward way sets him apart from the typical “blow dried politician who says whatever the voters want to hear.”
The problem is that Christie’s “ugly truth” about Social Security isn’t actually true. Christie echoes the mainstream media’s frequently repeated claim that to maintain the long-term solvency of Social Security we must raise the retirement age or cut benefits in some other way. But Social Security isn’t expected to have a shortfall for another 26 years, and even then its projected shortfall will be manageable (if no changes to the system are made, Social Security will still be able to pay 75 to 78 percent of scheduled benefits after 2036). This long-term funding gap in Social Security could easily be closed by raising revenues for the system; cutting benefits is simply not necessary.
*The only hoax here is the so-called crisis | Philadelphia Inquirer | 02/21/2011:
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