Faith in Social Security

Faithless Security:

Six in ten workers expect nothing from Social Security when they retire. Count me among them; I've never expected to see a red cent of the money they have taken from me and my family over the years.

The numbers are sixty-six percent up to age 55, and nearly eighty percent under the age of 35.

When you consider FICA as a line item expense, it is going to rank up there with your biggest monthly expenses. This is especially true if you are "self-employed," and paying fifteen-point-three percent of your income, pre-tax! Even if you are not self-employed, because the tax is figured into your wages, the tax is depressing your pay as well as swiping cash from your pocket.

In return for your other major expenses, you get some sort of positive good: food to eat, or a roof over your head. In return for this one, however, you are probably going to receive nothing at all if you are not already over 55 years of age. Furthermore, you know perfectly well that you are not likely to receive these benefits; and they are brought to your attention regularly, perhaps twice a month when you inspect your pay stub, or quarterly when you have to write a massive check to Uncle Sam.

My entire life I've watched the Congress spend every dime of the "trust fund," and leave a big IOU in the empty chest. I've watched the guarantors of Social Security treat those IOUs as if they were real money, when they should have been raising the roof with protests. They have given the henhouse to the foxes.

It's nothing but theft. Legal or not, it's just plain theft.