Time to Talk About the Buffett Rule

[JaneV2.0]

Tent City, here I come!

(BTW--good post, Chanterelle.)

[chanterelle]

Sure, just like healthcare costs, or military spending, or fancy GSA parties. It's all good, right? Maybe that's the solution to everything- the more the governemnt gives away the better we all are because hey, it all goes back in the economy.

What nonsense, the military and pharma's bloated costs do not come into play here ...local economies, meaning local jobs, local sales tax revenues, goods and services, local property taxes and rents, everything that a population spends on...the things that keep the basic economy chugging along. Keeping senior citizens above the poverty line and marginaly healthy is basic common economic sense if nothing else.

[Yossarian]

It was just an inquiry into why the "poor house" was a bogeyman. Some have claimed in the healthcare debate that we should remove the profit seeking entities from the equation. If you do that with nursing homes you basically have a govenrment owned operation to house and medicate the old folks. A modern day poor house so to speak.

[Yossarian]

What nonsense, the military and pharma's bloated costs do not come into play here ...local economies, meaning local jobs, local sales tax revenues, goods and services, local property taxes and rents, everything that a population spends on...the things that keep the basic economy chugging along.

Stop, you are killing me. Every place is local to the people who are there.

[JaneV2.0]

I have a friend whose elderly sister lives in a HUD-subsidized apartment. It sounds like a nice enough place with a sense of community among all the seniors. Most of the very old already live communally, so that part isn't much of a stretch. Personally, I dread living on top of a bunch of people, but it will probably come to that in the end.

[creaker]

I thought this was interesting:

http://www.elderweb.com/book/export/html/2806

One thing I didn't know - many programs to help the elderly prior to SS were denied if there were children or relatives capable of providing.

[LDAHL]

Whether you believe Americans are capable of saving and managing the decumulation of retirement assets for themselves, or that government must step in and do it for them, we ultimately depend on the performance of the economy to provide the wherewithal for the needed dividends or taxes. Part of the solution may be to link government benefit increases to economic growth. I think the Swedes do something like that with a notional account system for their national pension.

Apart from injecting a bit of reality into the ongoing debate, there might be some political benefit to making the interests of the recipients more consistent with those of the providers. We might spend less time arguing about symbolic but fiscally trivial items like the Buffet Rule and more time discussing strategies that could really matter.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Whether you believe Americans are capable of saving and managing the decumulation of retirement assets for themselves, or that government must step in and do it for them

What a silly blanket statement, rather depends on under what conditions. Doesn't it all? Some people earn so little that they will never be able to save for retirement. Even those that do, under very little real rate of return it is going to be harder. Even then I am not convinced impossible. But under a scenario of very little real rate of return with the costs of things needed by the elderly increasong more than inflation. Hmm, when you reach the point that 80-90% of people can't save for their retirement maybe time to call game over. Certain positions would just blame these people for not being the virtuous 10-20% though.

we ultimately depend on the performance of the economy to provide the wherewithal for the needed dividends or taxes.

True it is probably why the whole thing is ultimately unsustainable, since this economy is unsustainable, and then much will have to change (they'll um still be the need to meet the basic needs for old people who can't provide immediate income through their labor). No I'm not envisioning ice floes even in that situation. But not sustainable because natural limits are reached, and not sustainable because of deliberate pursuit of plutocracy and bad fiscal policy are different things (cutting taxes in general but especially cutting of payroll taxes - yes those taxes that most directly fund social security and medicare - is just bad fiscal policy).

[Gregg]

What nonsense, the military and pharma's bloated costs do not come into play here ...local economies, meaning local jobs, local sales tax revenues, goods and services, local property taxes and rents, everything that a population spends on...the things that keep the basic economy chugging along. Keeping senior citizens above the poverty line and marginaly healthy is basic common economic sense if nothing else.

Nonsense? I was in a town last week who's LOCAL economy is VERY closely tied to a large defense contractor with a plant there. That company is the largest employer in town (by far) and provides the jobs that are at the top of the scale for pay and benefits. Those ARE local jobs. With those paychecks the people buy their local goods, hire their local services, pay their local taxes... Without those jobs the farmer's market, the art gallery, the dental clinic, the cafe and all the other local businesses in the "basic economy" would chug along right into their graves.

There are very few, if any, local economies in this country that exist without influence and input from larger scale state, regional, national and even global forces. When it comes for caring for the elderly that is a good thing because there are very few, if any, local economies that have the money and the resources to do much of that. Best be careful what you wish for.

[ApatheticNoMore]

And there isn't anything else that federal government money could possible be used to do, but fund more "defense" department than even the pentagon asks for? There is a certain point where you know very well what you are asking for and can still wish for ... collapse (but even then it doesn't mean you wish for dumb ineffectual unjust ways to bring it on just because - as in lets reduce the funding for social security even more for a tax cut today!).