"Clueless." "Stupid." "Middle-class welfare." Sometimes a guy who likes facts and figures gets slapped in the face by reality, and apparently today's my day. Several recent stories showed me how some of these "austerity economics" advocates in Washington really feel about the middle class. I guess I always knew it intellectually, but these stories made me feel it on a visceral level. They let me know exactly what these politicians and pundits feel toward me,my family, and the people I grew up with:
Contempt.
We're not talking about lofty and imperious disdain, either. This isn't the old-school,"look down your monocle with a lofty air" genteel antipathy once practiced by the gentlemen at the club. We're talking about complete and utter contempt, a repugnance so white-hot it feels like it could melt your face off.
Debts of a Salesman
How else are we to interpret remarks like these from John Boehner, the Speaker of the House of Representatives? "People in Washington assume that Americans understand how big the problem is," Boehner said of Social Security, "but most Americans don't have a clue." Boehner added, ""I think the president shrank from his responsibility to lead. He knows the numbers as well as we do."
The Wall Street Journal account of Boehner's remarks goes on to quote Democratic Rep. Rob Andrews who, according the the Journal, said "tackling big problems would be tougher if the two sides criticized each other." Rep. Andrews: "It's impossible if the process begins with the parties attacking each other."
Then allow me, Rep. Andrews: Boehner's remarks are profoundly insulting to the American people. Don't worry about his attacks on the President, who can presumably take care of himself. It's the rest of us I'm worried about.
The Speaker said: "I think it's incumbent on us, if we are serious about dealing with the big challenges, that we go out and help Americans understand how big the problem is that faces us ... Once they understand how big the problem is, I think people will be more receptive to what the possible solutions may be."
The Speaker's already on record with his recommended "deficit solution": cuts to Social Security that could, according to the Speaker, help pay for America's war. The Journal article reiterated that Boehner is "determined to offer a budget this spring that curbs Social Security and Medicare."
The most generous interpretation of Boehner's remarks to the Wall Street Journal would be to assume that the Speaker is profoundly ignorant of the funding process for Social Security. But why can't we believe that the Speaker is merely misguided, as comforting as that would be? Because he and his party pushed a tax cut through for the wealthiest Americans last year that would have paid for any expected Social Security shortfall for the next 75 years! Specifically, as Daniel Marans pointed out, "the cost of extending the Bush tax cuts for the top 2% of Americans is equivalent to the cost of filling Social Security's 75-year shortfall. Both equal 0.7% of the GDP."
In other words, the Speaker doesn't care about the deficit. Whatever "big challenges" we face financially are largely the making of his party's policies on taxation, military spending, and -- lest we forget -- deregulation, which led to the trillion-dollar Wall Street crash and the BP oil spill. Fellow conservative David Frum has the Speaker pegged when he describes Boehner's remarks this way - "Boehner: I can sell voters on benefit cuts."
That's exactly right. What Boehner's really saying is "I can make these rubes buy anything." Have you ever met a really slick and utterly amoral salesman? There's an uber-hustler personality that's common to all salesmen of this type, whether he's a Wall Street banker or a car salesman in Idaho. One of the most common characteristics of the super-salesman personality is a sense of utter superiority to your sales prospect -- your mark. Boehner's really saying "I can sell you on giving up your future for my rich clients, and I'll make you love me for it."
And yes, we know that Boehner comes from humble beginnings. A lot of super-salesmen do. With this kind of personality, that background creates even more contempt. I rose above your little world, they say to themselves, but you never will. And as for those of us from middle-class or lower class backgrounds who think there are more important things in life than dedicating yourself to the pursuit of money and power ... for John Boehner and his kind, we're the biggest suckers of them all.
Middle-Class Welfare Queens
Robert Samuelson just doubled down on an amateurish insult to the American middle class by repeating his assertion that "Social Security is welfare." He gets the economics of the issue completely wrong, but the real contempt comes through with his insistence that "We don't call Social Security 'welfare' because it's a pejorative term, and politicians don't want to offend."
No. We don't call Social Security "welfare" because that word, like all words, has a commonly accepted definition and Social Security doesn't meet it. Whether you're using the conversational definition ("aid in the form of necessities for those in need") or the legal one ("government benefits distributed to impoverished persons to enable them to maintain a minimum standard of well-being"), the word doesn't describe Social Security. Social Security doesn't target the "impoverished" or "those in need" by design. Here's the word Mr. Samuelson would have found had he done some research:
Insurance. Social Security is a social insurance program, not a welfare program. And like any insurance program, it's designed to pay benefits when an insured event happens: A car accident. A plane flight you had to cancel at the last minute. Your retirement. Insurance programs aren't "means tested." If you've paid your premium and the insured event takes place, you receive the benefit. And Samuelson's argument that you should get back exactly what you put in is shown to be ludicrous when the proper word is used. I haven't "gotten back what I paid in" on my car insurance. And I could die without ever collecting Social Security benefits. I'm not being ripped off, I'm being protected.
Since he couldn't be bothered to look up the definition of the word, Samuelson just made up his own: "Here is how I define a welfare program," he writes. "First, it taxes one group to support another group, meaning it's pay-as-you-go and not a contributory scheme where people's own savings pay their later benefits. And second, Congress can constantly alter benefits ..." Leaving aside the misleading statement that Social Security "taxes one group to pay another," what else could be considered "welfare" under the making-sh*t-up" Samuelson definition? Let's see ... Military paychecks. The President's salary. The Senate dining room. The coffee they serve when junior Cabinet members meet with members of the press.
Yes, Samuelson's argument is that absurd, and the pejorative overtones of the word "absurd" are deliberate.Robert Samuelson's essentially calling the American middle class, whose pension plan was funded through a government-managed trust fund, "welfare queens."
Contempt.
Stupid. Greedy. Teat-Sucking.
"You've got a country that is stupid, a government that is stupid," said the always-quotable Alan Simpson today. What's so stupid about us? Here's Simpson's explanation: "... (W)e're always talking about the couple at the kitchen table--well, here it is: For every buck we spend, we borrow forty cents. If that isn't stupid--we've got a country that is stupid, a government that is stupid, to borrow forty cents, not from your good old uncle Henry, but from the world."
We've already dissected the lame analogy that says our country's spending is like a family's budget. It isn't - not even a little. But what really expresses Simpson's contempt for the American public is this: The set of personal suggestions he put together with Erskine Bowles (after the Deficit Commission they co-chaired collapsed into deadlock and failure) actually proposes lowering the maximum income tax rate for for wealthy individuals and corporations. Like Boehner, Simpson thinks he's found a bunch of suckers he can hoodwink in the American middle class.
For the record, Simpson's first name really is "Alan" and not "Abe," although he shares the Simpsons character's tendency to go off on foul-mouthed, insulting rants (in what's an arguably ageist characterization). It was Abe - sorry, I mean Alan Simpson who sneered at the entire population of the United States by saying government programs were like "a cow with 310 million tits." (That makes every one of us a "teat sucker.") It was Simpson who insulted a representative for women - and a lot of other women, too - after she wrote about his comment. It was Simpson who called elderly Americans "greedy geezers." It was Simpson who screamed at a female reporter in the 1990's (she screamed back) and went off on an activist in a now-famous profanity-ridden video tantrum.
And it's Simpson who has now insulted younger Americans - the ones who would be most hurt by his draconian anti-Social Security proposals - with another logorrheic rant, this one against young Americans who, he says, are "walking on their pants with the cap on backwards listening to the enema man (presumably meaning Eminem) and Snoopy Snoopy Poop Dogg."
It's not funny anymore - not that it ever was. The typical DC elite's response - "Oh, Alan's being Alan again" - doesn't cut it. This is vile, contemptible, hate-filled behavior with creepy scatological overtones. The crowd that loathes bloggers for the rude language of anonymous commenters embraces Simpson on a daily basis. Who in either party has said of Alan Simpson, "I can't work with somebody so unpleasant, so close-minded, so rude, so uncooperative, and who clearly holds the public in such vile disregard?"
I'll make the answer easy for you: Nobody. Such is the arrogance of the Beltway insider, and such is alienation of Washington reality from the hard work and anguish of the American middle class. A Washington culture that prides itself on "bipartisan" civility - that is, politeness to fellow members of the elite - finds Simpson's abuse of the American public perfectly acceptable.
Like I was saying: Contempt.
______________________
(Dean Baker has an excellent piece on Samuelson that makes many of the same points, plus quite a few others, and which reinforces this point: "Social Security is a pension that is run through the government.")
Richard (RJ) Eskow, a consultant and writer (and former insurance/finance executive), is a Senior Fellow with the Campaign for America's Future. This post was produced as part of the Strengthen Social Security campaign. Richard also blogs at A Night Light.
He can be reached at "rjeskow@ourfuture.org."
Website: Eskow and Associates
Follow Richard (RJ) Eskow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/rjeskow
1/3 of all Americans has zero net worth
Half of all Americans have no more than $2000 anywhere.
10% of all Americans own 85% of the retirement money out there.”
Well it can. Fiscal crisis is perfectly possible. There's no economic law that says America is immune. And should it happen then the recent recession might look like a cake walk in comparison, particularly when it comes to personal suffering.
And the table's being set for it with staggering deficits, increased government health spending, and a tsunami of entitlement spending that will take many years to crest. It could all come together in a perfect storm.
It's fine to criticize various politicians' plans for addressing the problem, but don't scoff at the problem. Treating "austerity" like an epithet is playing roulette with America's future.
They have cut taxes to where there isn't enough to pay the bills. They didn't try to pay off debt with Social Security money they borrowed. If they had it would have been simple to pay Social Security back.
This isn't new about the boomers taking more money since there are so many of them. That is why we paid a surplus since 1983.
They all say there will be a crisis.
I have a lot of respect for almost everyone in this country except the republican leaders, the DINOs and the rich who are sitting on a trillion dollars.
Many of us now in the middle class worked our way up from being born poor. We know the value of a dollar. We didn't save that money so the wealthy could save money on their taxes.
.
Real first testament stuff.
It goes wrong by including ALL the tax cuts, not just those that effect the top 2%.
Data from : http://www.jct.gov/publications.html?func=startdown&id=3715
.7% of a $ 14,800 billion GDP is $ 103.6 billion.
Over two fiscal years, "Retain the 33% and the 35% income tax brackets" will cost 50 billion. The capital gains and dividend low rates will cost about 26 billion. So the average cost for one year will be $38 billion.
I assume you accept that the statement is false. If not, please show a reference that explains how amending the ""TAX RELIEF, UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE REAUTHORIZATION, AND JOB CREATION ACT OF 2010," for just the top 2% of Americans would raise anything close to $100 billion a year.
While filling out the forms, and feeling somewhere between a failure and a leech, the social security advisor said " we're just trying to get the most we can, after all this is your RETIREMENT you're supposed to enjoy it."
You know what? Having paid into this insurance system for 40 years, He's RIGHT!
# 1
Instead of us spending so much time defending Social Security, we should be insisting that we get a fairer deal. Does it make sense to you that people lose so much if they retire early? I think it is 5% a year that the benefits are docked when you retire early.
What is mind boggling is we taxpayers pay for all other retirements from the military to those in public service, the unelected government. They get to retire a lot early with a lot higher benefits.
http://www.socialsecurity.gov/retire2/agereduction.htm
If you think you will live longer than normal, borrow money and wait for your full retirement age. If you have medical trouble or sky dive a lot, take the early retirement option.
@Obrudder: You are a success to work 40 years in Telecom. Best of luck.
"The most generous interpretation of Boehner's remarks to the Wall Street Journal would be to assume that the Speaker is profoundly ignorant of the funding process for Social Security. But why can't we believe that the Speaker is merely misguided, as comforting as that would be? Because he and his party pushed a tax cut through for the wealthiest Americans last year that would have paid for any expected Social Security shortfall for the next 75 years! Specifically, as Daniel Marans pointed out, "the cost of extending the Bush tax cuts for the top 2% of Americans is equivalent to the cost of filling Social Security's 75-year shortfall. Both equal 0.7% of the GDP."
In other words, the Speaker doesn't care about the deficit. Whatever "big challenges" we face financially are largely the making of his party's policies on taxation, military spending, and -- lest we forget -- deregulation, which led to the trillion-dollar Wall Street crash and the BP oil spill."
I would never openly question someone's claim to love this country, despite all evidence to the contrary, I will give them the benefit of the doubt and take their word for it.
BUT THEY clearly hate Americans or at the very least Dems, Libs, the Poor, Minorities and
women.
Regardless of the label, Social Security still collects revenue from current workers and employers at 12.4% of wages under $106,800, and pays out based upon the progressive Primary Insurance Amount (PIA) which calculates your average indexed monthly earnings, and then discards:
10% of your first $749,
68% between $749 and $4,517, and
85% over $4,517
Reference: http://www.socialsecurity.gov/OACT/COLA/piaformula.html
You really just ignored the proposal that Mr Samuelson was making: lowering SS benefits for those with household income over $75,000 in retirement in preference to taxing younger workers more through perhaps raisng the cap. I think it makes sense, at least as part of the solution, as increasing taxes on labor inputs in the U.S. will lead to shifting employment overseas.
Just make it simple. Have those earning over the $106,800 wage cap pay more. The higher earners live longer and draw more so they can afford to pay more.
$75,000 sounds like a lot after retirement, but it may not be that much in a few years after we see the inflation results of Bernanke's dollar printing and it's devaluation.
Those who invested and saved could lose their Social Security when they draw out $75,000 from their 401k.
What happens if you sell your home to buy a smaller one? What happens if you inherit?
Social Security is a bare bones retirement. People can still invest if they want to in a 401k.
If you inherit money, it is not taxable to you as income. (Although it probably should be.)
If you sell your primary residence, up to $250,000 is excluded .
http://www.irs.gov/publications/p523/ar02.html#en_US_2010_publink1000200709
For the uninsured: "They can use the ER for their medical needs"
This moves the cost to the working class in higher premiums and has little impact on the wealthy.
FOr the unemployed: "If we eliminate their dole, they will find a job. Drug testing should be part of the requirement. We should make them do volunteer work for their benefit. They are lazy"
The message is 'the unemployed' created the problem, so lets blame them and divide Americans into the 'dole abusers' and the workers who have to pay.
For womens rights: "Birth control and rape need to be micro managed by the FEDs"
The GOP again choose fiscally foolishness by bring more babies into the world and making even the 'handicapped' responsible for their 'being raped'
For the Wealthy: "We need to make sure they have enough money, less taxes etc"
The GOP is still transferring the wealth upwards.
On Jobs: "Lets cut the deficit and if there are jobs lost SO Be It"
Many of the cuts are for services and programs that support the working and poor classes.
Ideology and religion are their motivations. Juts one religion (Christian) however, all others are not included.
The message of the GOP is 'we believe in wealth' the middle class needs to pay more.
No surprise when many in Congress are worth more than $1,000,000
...and yes, it is defined by a contempt that is born out of ignorance, fear, and hatred of everyone and everything that is different from themselves.
Deliberately stoked by those who seek to manipulate those emotions (and the people harboring them) for their own gain.
Bond Market Shows Why Boehner Saying We’re Broke Is Only Figure of Speech
Reps were flat on their face. There were no "baggers". The Admin and Dem Congress are the authors of their own misfortune. An epic fail, as they say.
We are all happy to go along for the ride while the stock market and home prices were inflating at unsustainable rates. We are all happy to ignore the inflating bubble.
It is a bit late, and disingenous, to suddenly go looking for scapegoats now that the bubble has burst.
We're all to blame...and its now time to grow up and clean up the mess.
We didn't cut taxes over and over while continuing two wars that were not necessary.
We didn't lose 8 billion real dollars in Iraq. The money disappeared into some people's pockets, but not mine.
I personally missed the bubble in home prices and the stock market. It took me awhile to build back up when the tech bubble happened. Then I lost more in 2007 because of the swindles of Wall Street causing a crash. I didn't buy or sell a home during the housing bubble, but am paying for it because my home has been devalued.
No, we are not all to blame. Even though we voted to change things, it has continued.
Oh really Mr. Boehner? I think you may have overreached on this one.