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For Congressman Boehner:
Honorable Sir:
If corporate profits are indeed at record levels...if the richest 2% of the country has gotten that way by shipping our jobs overseas to increase their own bottom line..if the spread between rich and poor is widening, then WHY can't people who are better off and businesses that are booming SHARE in reducing our debt and helping rebuild the country!! Is it just because you want the White House back? Or because that top 2% and those booming businesses are the source of your campaign war chest? Those are WEAK reasons, Congressman, and if you keep this up without compromise it is the Republicans who will be blamed.
Signed,
Your Average Republican
Why is it that we always go to the rich when things get bad? The wealthy are not the one's using up Medicaid, Food Stamps, Temporary Assistance for Need Families cash benefits, and so on. They already pay 40% of the taxes. I agree with some of what President Obama has said, we DO need a balanced approach. Close tax loopholes that enable companies like GE to pay no taxes, cut spending $2 to $3 for every $1 we increase the debt limit, start taxing Federal benefits like Food Stamps and TANF, have the IRS start pursuing those who don't pay their taxes rich or poor, and finally end government subsidies to all private companies whether they are oil companies or solar energy companies as government cannot be in the business of picking winners and losers in a free market economy. We couly even go a step further of enforcing means testing for Socail Security and Medicare so those who can afford to would pay a higher premium or co pay for Medicare and would collect less Social Security if they made over a certain limit. There are so many things we could do that truly would amount to a balanced approach, but to single out one group of people and not another is in no way balanced and will never address the problems that must be dealt with.
Alaska, just a minor correction to your statement: The rich don't pay 40% of the taxes.
They pay 70% of the taxes. (Well, 40% if you only are doing the top 1% of all wage earners. It's 70% for the top 10% of wage earners.) -- Source: http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/indtaxstats/article/0,,id=133521,00.html
America needs to learn a little something called personal responsibility and accountability. I know, I know, these are not politically correct terms, and clearly racist, and I should be put in prison for even suggesting people take responsibility for their own actions and behaviors. But I'm going to say it anyway. I've already started planning for my own retirement, which'll be here in ~35 years. I've got a Roth IRA, Roth 401(k) and a work-matched regular 401(k) all set up. I sure wish the government wasn't grabbing that chunk of my paycheck for SS, but then, my parents paid in, and they do deserve to get some back, and it's gotta come from somewhere, right?
Alaska Marine, I agree with most of what you said. I think the balanced approach that Obama wats is the very best way to go.
I wonder if we could visit a little about Medicaid and food stamps. Our health problems could be solved and Americans would be better off if The Affordable Healthcare Act, which some refer to as Obama care, as it is enacted, could add in the Public Option. If not that, maybe America should move into a single payer plan for Healthcare.
Most Americans that are elderly today grew up in a different America. As a result of that society we have retirees today that do not have the means to do for themselves. They did not make enough money in their lives to be pepared for today's world.
Example: If you have an Aunt in retirement that sits at the poverty level because women could not get good paying jobs in the years past. She may need Medicaid and food stamps. If you have a Grandmother that perhaps finds herself in the same situation, then same thing! This could apply to brother's, sister's, a disabled or disadvantaged child, that could not help the way that they are born.
As a Senior Citizen in today's Society I can tell you that until we were almost into our 60's we could not by long term care insurance. It was not offered much before that. When we did try to purchase it, we were told that we could not purchase it because of Pre-existing conditions.
Their are other Seniors like that in our Society, today! We have been responsible with our money, but are very middle-class! If we need to go to the nursing home, once they go through our assests then there is no choice but to go on Medicaid. What about our Autistic Grandaughter now 11 years old. When her parents are no longer around and all other family is gone, what takes care of her? Some kind of a Government program. There is no other way. If there is I have not yet thought of it.
Many people are upset because of those in our society that appear to be unmotivated and lazy. That is very undersandable. However, this is my point of view. We have terrible options for care for the average people in America that need help with mental illness,addictions, etc. They can't pay for it. It is too expensive. If we could get these people well, and keep them well, then that would save us some money. In order to do that, we first have to invest!
We are busy building the infrastructure of other countries as ours is falling apart. Changes must be made! Yes, Obama is right! We need a balanced approach.
If my interest rates go up do to Washington's inability to figure this all out and compromise, I am going to bill Washington for all the overages I am forced to payout.
Matt,
Thank you for clarifying the actual percentages. As for paying into Social Security, I know many people who would opt out of it if they could. Social Security is going broke as a result of politicitians using it as their own slush fund. Medicare part D came from it, funding for wars came from it, and I'm sure more programs I don't know off the top of my head. Washington DC is running Social Security no differently than Madoff ran his scheme and certainly makes Enron pale in comparison. Personal responsibility is becoming a thing of the past and it's not all the average joe's fault. The Federal government is creating an environment where being self reliant is punished and frowned upon. We absolutely must meet our current entitlement program obligations, but some programs currently being defined as entitlement programs are not owed to anyone. Entitlement means that you deserve them like Social Security and Medicare, those programs were paid for and must be delivered, but no one pays into Food Stamps and begins collecting at a certain age, same goes for Medicaid and TANF. The issues are complicated and no one is going to leave the table happy, but how are those trying to save these programs going to feel when we get to the point where reform is not even an option?
I agree to an extent, Alaska. I think it is the responsibility of the people to take care of citizens who truly cannot take care of themselves, such as the disabled, mentally ill, and such. However, SS was never a solvent system. When enacted in 1935, people of the qualifying age that never paid a dime into the system immediately began collecting. That tells you right there, that the system was flawed to begin with. Additionally, I have no doubt that the "New Deal" was never meant to be a permanent solution, nor was it well thought-out or conceived with an ounce of foresight.
The defense budget is always one issue of contention, but most people don't realize SS/Medicare/Medicaid is the vast majority of the budget. Unfortunately since people want to "vote" money into their own pockets, it seems nearly untouchable. No one wants to take the sacrifice, they just want to defer it to the next generation. I have no issue with not receiving SS, but I do believe what should be done is an eventual abolishment, or at least, strong reduction in the scope of SS over time. Perhaps what they should do is make a law, all citizens born after 20XX will not pay, nor be eligible for SS retirement benefits. Let the government eat the debt in the short term and offset it by a small, but substantial time-based tax, such as an expiring national sales tax (spread over something like 20-30 years), and get the country back in the right direction. I'm pretty well-founded into libertarian views, but in order to fix the US, we have to adopt temporary measures to correct the system to return to the liberty-based values of the US framers and our Constitution.
Sometimes, considering the direction of the country and the way people vote (Rep, Dem, all the same), it makes me believe that America will continue to decline.
I agree, back when Social Security was created the eligible age was 65 and average life expectancy was 69. It was certainly not meant as a long term retirement program. People need to get back to planning for our own futures and if that means working until I'm 70 so be it, but I should not be able to retire at 65 just because the government says so and you're paying for it. If people would stop trying to live at a level it took their grandparents 70 years to get to we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with.
There is no property right or interest in employment. The job, its benefits and profits always belong to company and its owners. In most states, it is at-will employment--you work at the will of the employer. You give up everything to get the paycheck.
Don't like it? Start your own company...
I was very disappointed in the documentary last night. I expected so much more from Brian Williams and Co. I was so bored with the budget talks and seeing the footage over and over and over again of people walking down the corridors of the capitol. Come on NBC...you can do better than that!
Next time, bring in an acclaimed documentary maker from HBO for example to make your news special. There was hardly anything behind the scenes you showed us that we haven't already seen on the news. Let me give you an overview what it should have shown:
1) Quick 5 minute history of the capitol building, which should have included a map/layout of the building
2) 5 minute piece on how legislation works in the capitol. You'd be surprised how many Americans don't know how a bill gets passed. You completely failed to mention it.
3) Then follow key members of congress and their aides, but shown over a longer time-frame. Clearly the one day deal was a disaster as it didn't show anything behind the scenes
4) It would have been great to have seen behind the scenes work of how people write up a bill. Bring it to a committee, then to the floor, etc. But no...instead we got bored with interviews that didn't fit the documentary.
Next time...watch HBO on Monday Nights and learn how to put a documentary together. That's why they win so many emmys....