From: mike@uunet!tellab5!odgate (Mike J. Kelly)
Subject: Re: Middle-class entitlements (was Re: Taxing & Spending
Organization: Odesta Corporation
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 19:28:17 GMT

bboerner@novell.com (Brendan B. Boerner) writes:

>In article <1993Jan19.230303.2362@uunet!tellab5!odgate> mike@uunet!tellab5!odgate (Mike J. Kelly) writes:
>>alan@auntbea.austin.ibm.com (Alan R. Weiss) writes:
>>>I am SO damn tired of hearing this cliche.  I am part of the
>>>middle class.  I do not receive medicare, medicaid,
>>>I pay INTO social security, and I receive NO benefit from ANY
>>>budget busting programs except, perhaps, some benefit from
>>>military protective services.  So WHAT, exactly, am I getting
>>>for my money??
>>
>>Have you no parents?  Do they also receive no Social Security
>>payments and no Medicare coverage?

>Actually, I don't think they are.  Even if they were, I should be
>responsible for what my parents do?

I think they are, if they are over 62.  And you might consider who
WOULD be helping to support them if they weren't covered by social

security and Medicare.  Say, if a $15,000 hospital bill came in.

>>Will you never, ever be unemployed?  Wouldn't you like to be able
>>to get some kind of medical care if that happened?

>Since he at some point may be unemployed, he has to pay thousands,
>perhaps into the teens of taxes?  Couldn't he just keep some of that
>and save it himself (and investing it)?  Is it your contention that the
>government is better at insuring Alan's future than Alan is?

>>And, the real point is, do you care about anyone but *you*?

>Irrelevant, the claim was that the middle-class is receiving back in
>entitlements what they put in and Alan pointed out that he didn't think
>so and asked for proof.  You seem to acknowledge this and am now
>changing your argument to caring about others.  Which is it?

My point is that you have to look at the middle-class as a whole, not
an individual taxpayer at a particular point in time.  As a whole,
the middle-class is benefiting from government spending.  Only those
dreaming of some libertarian utopia think that MOST people would benefit
if government spending were replaced by private spending.  Private
spending doesn't build roads, or mass transit, or other public
infrastructure available to everyone.  Private spending doesn't provide
universal health insurance, like Medicare, as we all know all too well.

By asking "do you care about anyone but *you*" I was asking, don't you
see that you may be in a temporarily fortunate position while other
once middle-class people are not and need the help that you are now in
part paying for.  Who knows, someday you may be there.  You're parents
may already be there, and someday, we are all doomed to become like our
parents.  I don't have the exact figures handy, but a rather substantial
portion of social security recipients would be below the poverty line
if it were not for there social security income.  What is your solution
for them, and for others who in thirty or forty years would be like them.

>Also, me thinks a lot of younger middle-class
>taxpayers don't think they'll ever collect on SS and would like it
>abolished.

The fact that many middle-class people in their thirties and forties do
not believe that they will get anything from social security does not
prove anything other than that many people believe they will not ever
get anything from social security.  If they are planning on that basis,
more power to them; I am, too.

However, all that is necessary to fix this
problem is the political will to fix social security.  Consider: if
social security were invested in equities, the way any sane retirement
plan would be, it would easily outpace inflation and return enough to
pay our collective retirement incomes.  Why isn't it?  Well, that would
be (gasp) socialism!  Because before long, it would own much of U.S.
industry.  Seems logical -- our retirement income is pegged to the
overall performance of our economy.  If we instead abolish it, as
your suggestion, can you tell us why we aren't going to return to the
situation where a large proportion of elderly lived in abject poverty?  Or
is it your position that that is just their own problem?  A sort of
"Are there no prisions?"
-- 
--
Mike Kelly               Odesta Corporation, Northbrook, Illinois, USA
...!clout!odgate!mike    - Until odesta.com is registered.
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