BiggnightsAntisocial Insecurity: Why Our Grandparents are Laughing All the Way to the Bank
March 17th 2011 21:56
As a proud member of Generation Y, I take exception to how the Social Security crisis is playing out.
Our Social Security system is expected to run out of funds by 2030, which is a long time before I will retire (unless I’m extremely lucky). Just because the government made a few promises they couldn’t keep, my generation has to pay for this surplus. Every year since 1986, the government has been forced to essentially take the money from my generation, and put it right into the pockets of the Baby Boomers.
However, it's unlikely that we will get to reap the same benefits. Can the government really afford to add on more debt to a country that already has over $14 trillion of it?
A recent article in Bloomberg BusinessWeek took an interesting stance on our current debt predicament. It looked at the United States of America as a company, and as with any company, found ways to erase that debt and become profitable again.
Basically, to cause USA the company to break even any time soon, a drastic increase must be implemented into taxes or a drastic decrease must occur in government spending, specifically in health care. How the government handles America's debt will have a huge impact on Social Security.
If you still don’t believe that a lack of Social Security would be an injustice to my generation, then think of it this way: Say someone from Generation Y makes $40,000 in an entry level job next year. Now, imagine a Baby Boomer made the equivalent of $40,000 (adjusting for inflation) from their initial salary way back in the day. Well, the Baby Boomer’s $40,000 equivalent is worth more than the Generation Y member’s $40,000 because the Baby Boomer gets his social security payment back. I don’t think that’s what “time value of money” is supposed to mean. As a result, my entire generation is inherently poorer than past generations.
I’m not here to blame anyone for the Social Security crisis, and I’m certainly not trying to say I could have done a better job avoiding it than the government did. But I think my generation does need a voice. Someone has to reach out and help my generation when we retire.
This could be done through donations from Generation Z, the reduction of government spending, or simply government run seminars on how to save just to name a few ideas. Regardless of what the solution is, if you were to ever spend any significant amount of time around my idiot friends then you’d agree with me. God knows they could use some help.
The Bloomberg BusinessWeek article can be found here: Really Long Link
Our Social Security system is expected to run out of funds by 2030, which is a long time before I will retire (unless I’m extremely lucky). Just because the government made a few promises they couldn’t keep, my generation has to pay for this surplus. Every year since 1986, the government has been forced to essentially take the money from my generation, and put it right into the pockets of the Baby Boomers.
However, it's unlikely that we will get to reap the same benefits. Can the government really afford to add on more debt to a country that already has over $14 trillion of it?
A recent article in Bloomberg BusinessWeek took an interesting stance on our current debt predicament. It looked at the United States of America as a company, and as with any company, found ways to erase that debt and become profitable again.
Basically, to cause USA the company to break even any time soon, a drastic increase must be implemented into taxes or a drastic decrease must occur in government spending, specifically in health care. How the government handles America's debt will have a huge impact on Social Security.
If you still don’t believe that a lack of Social Security would be an injustice to my generation, then think of it this way: Say someone from Generation Y makes $40,000 in an entry level job next year. Now, imagine a Baby Boomer made the equivalent of $40,000 (adjusting for inflation) from their initial salary way back in the day. Well, the Baby Boomer’s $40,000 equivalent is worth more than the Generation Y member’s $40,000 because the Baby Boomer gets his social security payment back. I don’t think that’s what “time value of money” is supposed to mean. As a result, my entire generation is inherently poorer than past generations.
I’m not here to blame anyone for the Social Security crisis, and I’m certainly not trying to say I could have done a better job avoiding it than the government did. But I think my generation does need a voice. Someone has to reach out and help my generation when we retire.
This could be done through donations from Generation Z, the reduction of government spending, or simply government run seminars on how to save just to name a few ideas. Regardless of what the solution is, if you were to ever spend any significant amount of time around my idiot friends then you’d agree with me. God knows they could use some help.
The Bloomberg BusinessWeek article can be found here: Really Long Link
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