Sorry I don't have time to elaborate too much on all the questions, but a few answers: > . . . > 1) If I read this correctly, it sounds as if SS has never been > a "savings" account where money is paid into the account, invested for > the lifetime of the payees and then paid back to them when they > retire (or exit the workforce for whatever "legitimate" reasons). > If this is correct, is there a problem with this? Correct. Conservatives opposed a funded system originally because they didn't want the government to own a huge chunk of the private capital stock. > it and having the government set it aside for X years be a better > thing? Would it in fact be anything really different? > > 2) I have heard that "you don't get out of it what you put into it" as a > complaint. Is this a valid complaint? This is the "moneysworth" debate. For current and future generations, the rate of return will be lower than previous, with some possibility of a negative ROR for some in the future. But part of the debate is precisely whether comparing rates of return in the program to either past rates or private savings is a valid exercise. > > 3) I'm not quite sure why social security is not "insurance". How > does "insurance" differ from "government redistribution" in the case > of SS? Social insurance means the lack of correspondence between what you pay and what you get is due to mitigating social considerations, like putting a floor under retirement benefits for those with low lifetime earnings. Obviously there are lots of other differences between social insurance and private insurance, but there are equally large differences between social insurance and welfare. > > 4) Trivial: what do OASI and OASDHI stand for? Old Age and Survivors/Disability and Health/Insurance. > 5) How does the Social Security approach taken by the US differ from > that of Singapore? My brother just returned from a visit there and > said that the government just cut some aspect of it by a huge amount, > and my brother said that this was in effect a wage cut. Anyone know > the details of this? Don't know. If you don't save enough, they whip your ass with a cane? MBS
