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hailthefish posted:Like anyone currently under 50 is ever going to see a loving cent of Social Security anyway. That's bullshit. Most people will get some benefits just not the current defined benefits.
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Aug 28, 2015 21:38
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SS will actually be in pretty great shape once the baby boomers die off. It's mainly a question of if they will succeed in pulling the economic ladder up behind them so they can raid it for an iota of additional comfort, just like they have for the entire history of the generation.
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Aug 28, 2015 23:17
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This is not the thread for an idiotic derail about American domestic policy, hth
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Aug 28, 2015 23:20
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icantfindaname posted:My impression of the Chinese pension system is that it only ever existed on paper and most of the money would end up siphoned off by corruption anyways, but still, this is pretty much a guarantee nobody will be getting any of that money back, as opposed to just a likelihood Most government pension systems in East Asia are a huge joke anyway. They are dependent on children caring for parents and paying for everything. If they had to actually pay real money to the elderly they would be hosed anyway.
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Aug 28, 2015 23:42
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GoutPatrol posted:Most government pension systems in East Asia are a huge joke anyway. They are dependent on children caring for parents and paying for everything. If they had to actually pay real money to the elderly they would be hosed anyway. What's the literal translation of the Chinese name for alztheimers and dementia, again?
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Aug 29, 2015 00:40
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Ardennes posted:Japan was a firm US ally across the Cold War, and it didn't help them. Hell, there were theories circulating that Japan would rearm and attack the US. Fear-mongering doesn't really need much reality attached to it. That's not true, the Japanese Miracle was built on client-state favorable trade policy from the US. You think the big Japanese firms were selling their products to the Japanese in the 70s? Soviets? The relatively small economic bloc of Western-Europe-minus-Spain-and-half-of-Germany?
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Aug 29, 2015 01:32
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Vladimir Putin posted:I remember GWB sent legislation to allow Social Security to be invested in Wall Street. This was at the start of his second term and years before the financial crisis. Good thing that idea never came to fruition or all of that money for retirees would have disappeared. Except anything invested back in 2005 would be worth significantly more now, regardless of the 2007 crash. It's not like the small private portion of your overall Social Security benefit was going to be funneled into Chrysler, it'd be indexed on the whole market. Instead it was all spent on budget deficits in the form of Treasury IOU's.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:19
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GoutPatrol posted:Most government pension systems in East Asia are a huge joke anyway. They are dependent on children caring for parents and paying for everything. If they had to actually pay real money to the elderly they would be hosed anyway. This is true. I think China only started pensions in like the 90s so most people don't have them. The pension in Korea was like $200 a month or something equally worthless. The expectation is the company you salarymanned for will add more, and kids take care of the majority. The people who didn't have that were the ones you saw in the street collecting cardboard to sell and digging through the trash piles for edible food.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:25
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Krispy Kareem posted:Instead it was all spent on budget deficits in the form of Treasury IOU's. The US Treasury Bill -- a notoriously irresponsible investment.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:32
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Krispy Kareem posted:Except anything invested back in 2005 would be worth significantly more now, regardless of the 2007 crash. It's not like the small private portion of your overall Social Security benefit was going to be funneled into Chrysler, it'd be indexed on the whole market. Privatizing social security is dumb as poo poo hope this helps. Incidentally, it was also stupid as poo poo when China did it for parts of pensions just now.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:34
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Arglebargle III posted:The US Treasury Bill -- a notoriously irresponsible investment. It's a terrible investment when it enables Congress to run deficit spending. We have spent five trillion dollars in Social Security surpluses. I think 2009 or 2010 was the first year we didn't borrow against those surpluses only because we didn't have a surplus.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:45
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Krispy Kareem posted:It's a terrible investment when it enables Congress to run deficit spending. We have spent five trillion dollars in Social Security surpluses. I think 2009 or 2010 was the first year we didn't borrow against those surpluses only because we didn't have a surplus. Deficit spending is the correct thing to do when you're the richest country and key to the world economy.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:49
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Krispy Kareem posted:It's a terrible investment when it enables Congress to run deficit spending. We have spent five trillion dollars in Social Security surpluses. I think 2009 or 2010 was the first year we didn't borrow against those surpluses only because we didn't have a surplus. And that spending would have yielded greater returns in an index fund?
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Aug 29, 2015 02:52
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Arglebargle III posted:And that spending would have yielded greater returns in an index fund? I dunno, what is the ROI for a squadron of f-35's? The point is no one can really say what they spent that five trillion on. Maybe some social programs, perhaps a sub that will someday prove the deciding deterrent in a war. Or more than likely a vote buying scheme. But it's spent now and eventually will have to be repaid with interest. The Bush plan at least put aside a portion of that. Almost like a Social Security lockbox lite. It wasn't a great plan, but it was better than the current system.
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Aug 29, 2015 03:06
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Krispy Kareem posted:
No, it really wasn't, unless you're a banker who'd be making money off of it.
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Aug 29, 2015 03:08
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Krispy Kareem posted:I dunno, what is the ROI for a squadron of f-35's? You have a very simplistic understanding of spending. Have you ever had an economics survey course or a macroeconomics course? Not trying to be mean here, just saying you might want to look up how money moves through an economy. Distributing that money to blue-chip companies through an index fund isn't necessarily a better investment than dropping palettes of cash Arglebargle III fucked around with this message at 03:17 on Aug 29, 2015 |
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Aug 29, 2015 03:13
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Arglebargle III posted:You have a very simplistic understanding of spending. Have you ever had an economics survey course or a macroeconomics course? Not trying to be mean here, just saying you might want to look up how money moves through an economy. Distributing that money to blue-chip companies through an index fund isn't necessarily a better investment than dropping palettes of cash I have a minor in Economics. Deficit spending is one of those things that economists disagree on, so there's no clear cut correct answer. Using money meant for future retirement payments for today's budget overages is one of those things you can get away with for short stretches of time - like austerity in Europe. Probably not a good idea to do it for decades and to literally use all the surplus. The Bush plan was useful in that it at least saved a small sliver of the Social Security surplus for later. I think I remember back of a napkin calculations that had it saving hundreds of billions of dollars over 20 years. It also would have had a better return than those Treasury IOU's over the last decade even with the Great Recession. And it would have made some Wall Street bankers very rich with commissions - but a rising tide lifts all boats, am I rite?
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Aug 29, 2015 04:03
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The calculations showing it saving money without reducing benefits paid were bullshit, that's why even Republicans were against it. It's a brain dead idea only floated so that d some rich assholes could rake some extra profit off the top.
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Aug 29, 2015 04:09
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Krispy Kareem posted:I have a minor in Economics. I'm surprised that you have a minor in Economics and yet think "saving" the SS trust fund is a good idea. How do you think treasury bills work?
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Aug 29, 2015 04:20
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Arglebargle III posted:I'm surprised that you have a minor in Economics and yet think "saving" the SS trust fund is a good idea. How do you think treasury bills work? My problem is deficit spending now that'll just result in more deficit spending later when the surplus is no longer there and Social Security payments start becoming a major drag on budgets. I could care less what the SS trust fund is invested in; they could stuff it in Joe Biden's mattress. The problem is using that money in lieu of balancing current budgets. Of course if money gets tight, we can always cut benefits, which is what China will be doing with its pension plans in short order.
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Aug 29, 2015 04:50
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Knowing how hosed China is, how hosed is Tony Abbot's fascist government? 
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Aug 29, 2015 04:53
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Krispy Kareem posted:My problem is deficit spending now that'll just result in more deficit spending later when the surplus is no longer there and Social Security payments start becoming a major drag on budgets. I could care less what the SS trust fund is invested in; they could stuff it in Joe Biden's mattress. The problem is using that money in lieu of balancing current budgets. Of course if money gets tight, we can always cut benefits, which is what China will be doing with its pension plans in short order. What would the social security trust fund have been invested in if Congress hadn't engaged in deficit spending?
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Aug 29, 2015 05:26
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Arglebargle III posted:That's not true, the Japanese Miracle was built on client-state favorable trade policy from the US. You think the big Japanese firms were selling their products to the Japanese in the 70s? Soviets? The relatively small economic bloc of Western-Europe-minus-Spain-and-half-of-Germany? Japan was still a US ally even if the US purposefully allowed them to have a trade advantage, if anything it was a key part of the relationship. The insanity was assuming that Japan was just "pretending" to be an ally just to rebuild and "bomb pearl harbor again." My point is the limited nature of the JDF and their relationship with the US "didn't help them" in the eyes of paranoid American conservatives and the press (including popular authors Micheal Crichton) who did their best to build up a fear of the Japanese among the public during the mid 1980s to the early 1990s. Once the property market crashed in Japan, a decade later you started seeing similar paranoia directed at China. Ardennes fucked around with this message at 06:03 on Aug 29, 2015 |
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Aug 29, 2015 05:52
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Mozi posted:My understanding of the pension thing in particular is that it was likely planned all along, is not a bad or terrible thing in and of itself Vladimir Putin posted:I remember GWB sent legislation to allow Social Security to be invested in Wall Street. PC LOAD LETTER fucked around with this message at 06:01 on Aug 29, 2015 |
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Aug 29, 2015 05:58
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PC LOAD LETTER posted:Nah it really is pretty bad. Loading up pension funds with overvalued stocks is a great way to cause them to go insolvent or have funding problems which leads to cuts in pensions. It just that the funding problems or insolvency tends to happen years or decades down the road when finally enough people begin to retire but the people who originally caused the mess are safe n' rich cuz' IBGYBG is depressingly effective. Actually I'd say that it is substantially worse. Investing money in Wall Street can be a solid move, in a properly diversified portfolio looking to last for a very long time. At least at the time the market seemed to be doing well and was giving solid returns - it would all blow up, but it always does eventually and when you're talking about 5 trillion dollar lumps of money looking to be providing service over the next century then it can still be a good plan to put some of it into a market and play the long game. It would've been a shitshow, but conceptually I can see how something like Social Security would be a good candidate for diversification into different investments. China pouring funds into a market that is already been intentionally bubbled to the point of bursting is just dumb. You're forcing money into a system to keep it propped up, meaning the price is already above where it should be and the intention is to push it higher. The fundamentals don't change, it just means you're tying even more boats to the sinking ship. Throwing good money after bad, I think the phrase is.
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Aug 29, 2015 10:42
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ohgodwhat posted:What would the social security trust fund have been invested in if Congress hadn't engaged in deficit spending? I think it depends on what side of the ledger you're on. Everyone seems to be speaking from the SS Trust Fund side, which says T-bills are pretty good and even if you're only getting 2 to 3 percent return, that's 2 to 3% on 5 trillion dollars. But on the Congressional side, that's money that's been spent, much of it wasted, that will now need to be paid back as Baby Boomers continue to retire. We could have invested it in Pets.com for all the good it'll do to future budgets. I mean, if we had decent inflation we might have a little break in what we owed. But we don't even have that right now.
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Aug 29, 2015 13:16
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Krispy Kareem posted:I think it depends on what side of the ledger you're on. Everyone seems to be speaking from the SS Trust Fund side, which says T-bills are pretty good and even if you're only getting 2 to 3 percent return, that's 2 to 3% on 5 trillion dollars. But on the Congressional side, that's money that's been spent, much of it wasted, that will now need to be paid back as Baby Boomers continue to retire. We could have invested it in Pets.com for all the good it'll do to future budgets. You mean on the discretionary budget side? So they should have put the SS trust fund money into treasury-bills, then taken the cash and just sat on it and ten years later start paying back the T-bills having never used the money? Or is your beef really just that you don't want Congress running deficits and you don't care where the money comes from? What if we'd put the SS money in a "lawck bawcks," do you think Congress would not have mandated deficit spending and the treasury would not have issued bonds to meet the Federal Government's deficit spending obligations?
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Aug 29, 2015 14:16
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Arglebargle III posted:You mean on the discretionary budget side? So they should have put the SS trust fund money into treasury-bills, then taken the cash and just sat on it and ten years later start paying back the T-bills having never used the money? Or is your beef really just that you don't want Congress running deficits and you don't care where the money comes from? What if we'd put the SS money in a "lawck bawcks," do you think Congress would not have mandated deficit spending and the treasury would not have issued bonds to meet the Federal Government's deficit spending obligations? If Al Gore's dream had been realized it would have at least made deficit spending slightly more difficult and perhaps not as opaque. But yeah, I don't like deficits. I voted Ross Perot in my first election if that's any indication of how much I dislike deficits. But back on topic, how about those Chinese?
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Aug 29, 2015 15:45
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ProfessorCurly posted:Investing money in Wall Street can be a solid move, in a properly diversified portfolio looking to last for a very long time.
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Aug 29, 2015 15:49
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Deficit spending is the correct thing to do when the entire world is happy to buy your debt at rates like 0.001% ahead of inflation.
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Aug 29, 2015 15:57
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ProfessorCurly posted:Actually I'd say that it is substantially worse. Investing money in Wall Street can be a solid move, in a properly diversified portfolio looking to last for a very long time. At least at the time the market seemed to be doing well and was giving solid returns - it would all blow up, but it always does eventually and when you're talking about 5 trillion dollar lumps of money looking to be providing service over the next century then it can still be a good plan to put some of it into a market and play the long game. It would've been a shitshow, but conceptually I can see how something like Social Security would be a good candidate for diversification into different investments. Like we wouldn't do the exact same thing if we could. The major disagreement between the parties during the crisis was whose money to sacrifice to the god of the mythical "soft landing".
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Aug 29, 2015 20:02
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Really the stupdiest thing about putting social security and pensions into the stock market is that it fucks over those who end up retiring during recessions. They're supposed to be there so you aren't completely hosed if stuff like that happens.
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Aug 29, 2015 20:52
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Y'all know that pensions are invested in equity markets? Like all of them. That's why they usually become underfunded in recessions and then have nice returns following? Check out uaw's pension over the last decade. Anyway, the long term returns on China's pensions won't be "too" damaged as long as they buy in piece wise over the next market cycle. They'll over pay for some periods and get good deals over others. But that's also assuming the CCP follows actuarial practices of risk management and not, CHINA STRONG.
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Aug 29, 2015 21:34
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The problem isn't investing pensions it's the government treating the stock market like time clickers and saying the numbers only go up.
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Aug 29, 2015 22:18
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It also doesn't make throwing pension funds onto risky investments in order to pump up the market (which is, again, the explicit policy here) any more sensible.
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Aug 29, 2015 22:18
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cheesetriangles posted:The problem isn't investing pensions it's the government treating the stock market like time clickers and saying the numbers only go up. Since the buttonwood agreement U.S. Equity markets have only gone up, but there are periods in which they will not. Zohar posted:It also doesn't make throwing pension funds onto risky investments in order to pump up the market (which is, again, the explicit policy here) any more sensible. Hence using actuarial practices vs China strong. Do you know the purchasing phases they will make? I don't but suspect it falls into China strong, per their words and desperate actions, which I agree is not sensible. Still, it doesn't mean those pension dollars won't have a positive ROI in 25 years from now. Look at the returns on the s/p 500 from September of 1987 vs December of 1987 to present to illustrate my point.
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Aug 29, 2015 22:36
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hailthefish posted:Like anyone currently under 50 is ever going to see a loving cent of Social Security anyway. Piffle.
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Aug 29, 2015 23:10
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ITT no one has heard of institutional investors
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Aug 29, 2015 23:13
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Cultural Imperial posted:ITT no one has heard of institutional investors Also we learn the value of an undergraduate economics minor.
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Aug 29, 2015 23:26
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Cultural Imperial posted:ITT no one has heard of institutional investors I work for one.
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Aug 29, 2015 23:41
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