“The campaign, which was born in the fever swamps of 4chan and Reddit message boards, involved creating hundreds of fictional personas with gray cartoon avatars, known as NPCs.”
The enlightening commentary on Internet jokes just keeps getting better and better:
“These accounts posed as liberal activists and were used to spread — among other things — false information about November’s midterm elections”
What the hell, does the author think that this is some elaborate scheme by the Russians (who can do everything by the way)?
“NPC Wojak is a variation of Wojak, an old cartoon (also known as “feels guy”) that has become a kind of collective mascot for the far-right commenters online. In recent weeks, users on 4chan and Reddit have made all kinds of memes featuring NPC Wojak. ”
Oh look, tis the far-right pejorative used again on someone that doesn’t agree in lock-step with the Democratic Party and media.
“And then, when progressives object to a meme that portrays them as unthinking automatons, it becomes another piece of evidence: See? The left can’t take a joke.”
Glad to see that we can agree that the left has no sense of humor. If you guys could take a joke there would’ve been no need to write this dumb article or for Twitter to ban thousands of obvious parody accounts.
“The campaign began as a joke. But a few of the accounts started posting misleading information about the midterm elections, including encouraging liberals to vote on Nov. 7. (Election Day is Nov. 6.) ”
Damn, the author really doesn’t have a sense of humor does he? Has Mr. Alex Burns never heard this joke before? Does he really not understand it? This next excerpt takes the cake though:
“Are these Russian bots?
Probably not. (Although some of the NPC accounts may have been automated, there is no sign that Russia is involved in this.) Mostly, it appears to be a 4chan joke that spiraled into some mild voter suppression.“
An Internet meme is now voter suppression, who knew? Since the NPC meme is so clearly effective and accurate why not post up some NPC memes? Enjoy and be sure to share with your fellow NPCs!!!
In yet another debate with progressives they gave almost no evidence to back up their assertions. In today’s post, we’ll go over some propaganda concerning Iceland. According to The Other 98%:
The Reuters story Michael linked me to was the only source of information that he gave me. In it the article states that a whole four people went to prison. The statement concerning “bailed out its citizens” is not explained. Perhaps that’s what progressives call nationalizing industries? Concerning Iceland’s recovery, “strongest” isn’t actually compared to anything nor is any citation or data provided. Using data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and World Bank we can compare recoveries between the U.S. and Iceland. I bet if I watch the movie that Erik Vinge told me to I’ll be properly re-educated right?
If you look at just GDP, there seems to be little difference. I suppose that Iceland did better than Greece.
I could keep going, but the idea that Iceland is a utopia or is experiencing amazing performance is simply unfounded. Was a country that just experienced a depression supposed to keep contracting forever? Have progressives never heard of the business cycle? Do progressives really think that all bad investments can be avoided?
Have you always wanted to know how much of a bigoted, xenophobic, racist that you are? Now there’s a convenient quiz for you to take at CheckMyPrivilege.com! (Edit 08 June 2020: Dead link) Isn’t this just wonderful comrade? This website has many more amazing features such as:
The Bill Split Calculator–Never again will you have to argue with your friends about how much the more privileged should have to chip in for the pizza because of their oppressive positions! Simply have your friends all Check Their Privilege, save their scores on the results page, and use the Calculator to determine how much they each owe! It couldn’t be simpler!
Campus Investigation Service-We can save you loads of headache and paperwork by keeping your administrative staff employed. Visit the Campus Investigations page and call today for a free consultation on how we can help you!
It turns out that if you answer the questions with the jist of being a healthy, white, heterosexual male you get a score of 175 with the rank of “Shitlord“! Isn’t good for progressive and tolerant liberals to let you know how much they accept you?
If you’re a healthy, genderqueer, non-working, Middle Eastern, Muslim, homosexual you get a score of -1275.
If you’re a poor, female, cis-gendered, black/white, bisexual teacher you get a score of -875.
Let’s read some testimonials from some proud patrons:
I still cannot believe how much society has lied to me. I used to think that being a white middle-classed German with a penis was ok, and that my life was ok. But since I never identified as a male, and honestly didn’t give a fuck about what gender I am, and am slightly physically hindered by a weak terminal desease, I was so wrong. It must have been the patriarchal internalised agenderphobia that lead me to believe this. Only know have I realised how oppressed I truely am! I will be starting my blog in the next week, visit me there to witness me fighting patriarchal oppression of women and other gender minorities, please. This has changed my life, thank you, checkmyprivilege.com!
Benji
Never in my life have I ever come to the terms with the fact I was a shitlord. Ever since I was born I now realise, I have been oppressing and raping every woman I have ever laid eyes on. Only now do I realise just how oppressing I am despite being an ugly faced, disfigured, bisexual latino all because I was born a man. Thanks checkmyprivilege.com for helping me realise how oppressing I really am to all the woman of the world!
Pablo
Thanks Check My Privilege! I now know I am a fuck boy white cis scum male! 😀
ShitLordWhiteMale
Thank you Check My Privilege for affirming what I have known since 1990. As I continue on my unchecked march toward becoming a plutocrat, I pledge to prey on innocent young men to satiate my ravenous sexual appetite.
Priveleged Shit Baroness
As always, be sure to share this with your friends and aid in the re-education. Otherwise, get them some warm clothes and a shovel!
Good afternoon comrades, today we’re going to go over yet another glorious social justice warrior demand: racial profiling. That’s right folks, social justice warriors are no demanding that you be able to correctly identify their exact race just by glancing at them. Nothing is more important to these young Party members than racial identification and a “sense of belonging” to a certain racial group. Simply talking with people as individual people instead of a collective is not possible for social justice warriors.
Watch as this thoughtcriminal attempts to use logic and reason against valiant social justice warriors. Why doesn’t this wretched fiend Undoomed understand that logic and reason are the ideals of some dead, white males? Perhaps he needs a daily two minutes of hate?
Good evening comrades, it’s time for another round of glorious pictorial propaganda to celebrate Citizen Senator Sanders. The fun never stops at Economic Illiterates for Bernie Sanders 2016. After Bernie is inaugurated next year he will usher in a new era of utopia not seen since the Great Depression. Total government spending will go up from approximately 35% of GDP to double or raise to even greater heights and fully snuff out the private sector. The conversion of the United States of America to the United Socialist States of America will be complete and the last vestiges of capitalism will be purged from society. We will truly live in a paradise. Forward!
This was produced by a genuine Bernie supporter! Isn’t it awesome?!
Greetings comrades, tonight we will be exploring a new frontier in social justice: air conditioning. Let’s listen to Comrade Sanghani break it down for us:
Now let’s take a look at what the Communist News Network has to say concerning this issue:
All feminists need to create a most equal society is more power and most importantly, more money. You may not have known before that air conditioning is sexist but now you do. Perhaps a more important question is: what isn’t sexist? What new boundaries will social justice push? What new slights and insults will be discovered? Perhaps gay men are sexist for not wanting to have sex with women? Subscribe to Poor Me! magazine to find out!
These thoughtcriminals dared to scoff at the valiant feminists in the videos. Off to the gulag with them!
Honestly, how is one supposed to satirize such a story? What could I add to make feminism seem any more ridiculous? I could always identify actual restrictions of liberty and persecution for them. How about Iran, where it is a matter of national policy to follow Sharia and execute homosexuals? We could look at South Africa, where one in four men admit to committing rape? I guess that it’s the white man’s fault that Iran executes homosexuals. Based upon one of the Puffington Host articles I found about South Africa that’s what progressives seem to be doing:
“The South African Constitution is arguable one of the most progressive constitutions in the world, for innumerable reasons, but for the purposes of this blog post, I want to focus on the fact that Section 9, Subsection 3 specifically prohibits discrimination against people on the basis of their sexual orientation.”
“The problem, though, is that there seems to be a gap in South Africa between the legal realm and the sociocultural realm. And in this gap appears the phenomenon known as ‘corrective’ rape. Corrective rape is a phenomenon wherein a homosexual person is raped as a means of ‘correcting’ their sexual orientation. In most cases, the victims are black lesbians. This phenomenon takes place in other countries as well, but for the purposes of this post I’m focusing on South Africa.”
“In South Africa most cases of corrective rape are against black lesbians, and I’m going to analyze this phenomenon in the context of a post-apartheid South Africa deeply embedded in a culture of heteronormativity. I read a very enlightening article by Megan Morrissey in the journal Womyn’s Studies in Communication, which talks about the discourse among black South Africans around corrective rape. In the article Morrissey discusses the common argument from black Africans that the practice of homosexuality is un-African, something brought about during colonization. ”
“Many people quoted and interviewed in the article state that homosexuality is exclusive to the white man and his culture. By distancing black African culture from homosexuality, these people marginalize black gay Africans from their own culture. There is a further alienation of black lesbians, who would only be allowed back into the larger culture if their non-normative sexual orientation changed. So men subject these womyn to corrective rape as a ‘rite of passage’ back into the culture, because they believe that this act would force these womyn to ‘submit,’ become heterosexual, and assume their ‘proper’ role in society. ”
Even though the crime is being committed by someone else, the evil white man is to blame for someone else’s culture.
“In South Africa, homosexuality is associated with white culture, and because of the years of apartheid rule, there exist tensions between black and white cultures in South Africa. Homophobia and violence, in the form of corrective rape, is a means to marginalize the white culture and regain a nationalistic identity that they believe was stolen from them due to years of colonization and apartheid.
Corrective rape is thus, on a very general level, a post-colonial and post-apartheid reaction to the white culture in South Africa. This explanation does not excuse their actions, but is does trace the violence back to the source. The question is: What next? The reason that corrective rape has persisted is that there has been a cultural, social, and even legal normalization and acceptance of the practice.”
So, black South Africans are doing what they did before the British Empire pushed the Boer Republics and black African nations together in the same country? This is the fault of the Dutch, Boer Republics, and British? Amazing logic.
“There needs to be a cultural and social resocialization and subsequent normalization of homosexuality in South Africa, and the first step toward ensuring that the citizens accept non-normative sexuality is to show that the state supports it. To do that, the state needs to provide legal and political recourse for victims and survivors of corrective rape in South Africa.”
So South Africa needs to undergo “resocialization” does it? I thought that progressives believed that “indigenous” cultures should be left alone? The author, Ms. Okafor, doesn’t seem to realize that politics follows culture. Ms. Okafor might not also realize that reality doesn’t work like McMaster University. South Africa is acrime-ridden hellhole, and that’s probably not changing anytime soon.
“The U.S. Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, which requires businesses to report all assets held by Americans, aims to recoup the hundreds of billions the U.S. says it loses each year from tax evasion. But it’s also leading global banks big and small to dump U.S. customers rather than wrestle with the complicated law. ”
The CNN Money article just gets better and better:
“Proper compliance — which means reporting everything from basic savings accounts, pension funds, investments, and more — could easily cost institutions millions each year, he estimated. And penalties are severe; businesses face a 30% tax on U.S.-sourced income if they fail to comply.”
Laws meant to take even more money from citizens are backfiring? Who would’ve guessed that one? Certainly not any progressives would see the fault in raising tax rates or adding numerous regulations. I’m sure that progs would say something about everyone needing to pay their fair share even though consumption taxes (sales tax, gasoline tax, etc.) are what is used to fund infrastructure. Loyal Party members (and the Internal Revenue Service) might also find it hard to believe that a citizen should get keep more than a minority of their income. Surely, the United States will soon complete its conversion to the United Socialist States of America (U.S.S.A) and turn into a worker’s paradise like East Germany, Cuba, Detroit, Venezuela, or Greece.
The number of U.S. citizens is still pretty small and I believe that it will increase rapidly. It’s a progressive goal to have less rich people in the United States and they may yet get what they desire. I imagine that the intent was to make us all equal rather than allowing people to leave though.
What would a progressive do to keep the tax money flowing in? What would a progressive do to ensure that thoughtcriminals are dealt with?
Martin Schulz is confused as to why not everyone sees the world the way that he does.
One of the most interesting articles that I’ve seen lately on Yahoo! News concerns how European Union leaders are worried about control of Europe slipping from their grasp. From the article “‘EU in danger’ of disappearing, warns Schulz” European Parliament President Martin Schulz believes that the E.U. may not last another decade.
“‘The European Union is in danger. No one can say whether the EU will still exist in this form in 10 years,’ Schulz said in an interview with German newspaper Die Welt.”
Free trade isn’t enough for elitists such as Schulz; he and his other central planners must dictate how European governments operate.
“In the EU there were now ‘forces at work to drive us apart,’ said the German politician.”
I thought that E.U. leaders claimed to care about democracy? Not when it gets in the way of their control it seems.
“We must avoid this because the consequences would be dramatic.”
You don’t say Schulz? Dramatic consequences such as not tying Germany, France, Portugal, and Greece to the same currency?
“The alternative to the EU would be a ‘Europe of nationalism, a Europe of borders and walls’ — a formula that had led the continent into ‘catastrophe’ repeatedly in the past, Schulz said.”
Schulz wouldn’t want citizens of European countries to think for themselves as it’s simply too dangerous. Never fear though, he will ensure the safety of Europe by: taxing its peoples of the majority of their incomes, controlling their lives, and bringing in millions of refugees while doing nothing to verify that there are no dangerous elements among them. What could possibly go wrong with such a plan?
“Germany is on course to take in one million asylum seekers this year, half of them from Syria.”
“Schulz voiced concern about a lack of solidarity by many EU members in hosting the refugees, and about moves by several eastern European countries to build new barriers.”
Schulz just can’t seem to get over the fact that not everyone agrees with him. Why should the proles, I mean citizens, think for themselves?
The world does not belong to those who would slander the Prophet!
Based upon recent election results in France I believe that French citizens do not care what people like Schulz think. The Front National has received more votes than both the Republicans and Socialist Party.
A constant refrain that I hear from progressives is that the United States had 90% taxes during the 1950s and the country was still prosperous. Progressives seem to believe that it is a golden era that we need to emulate in all economic facets…
I wonder how many of these proud Party members have actually taken the time to think about what caused the United States to be the world’s pre-eminent economic power during the 1950s. Is it possible that 90% income tax rates on the wretched and vile “1%” led to economic prosperity (or at least didn’t hinder it) or is there something more to the story? Let’s start by taking a look at what taxes were paid to the Federal Government in the post WWII years (I bet WWII took a while to pay off also). A publication produced by UC Berkeley in 2007 entitled “How Progressive is the U.S. Federal Tax System? A Historical and International Perspective”provides much insight into what the “1%” actually paid in taxes in the 1950s. Let’s take a look:
“The 1960 federal tax system was very progressive even within the top percentile, with an average tax rate of around 35 percent in the bottom half of the top percentile to over 70 percent in the top 0.01 percent. This finding illustrates the theme that it is important to decompose the top of the income distribution into very small groups to capture the progressivity of a tax system. Although very top groups contain few taxpayers, they account for a substantial share of income earned, and an even larger share of taxes paid.
Interestingly, the larger progressivity in 1960 is not mainly due to the individual income tax. The average individual income tax rate in 1960 reached an average rate of 31 percent at the very top, only slightly above the 25 percent average rate at the very top in 2004. Within the 1960 version of the individual income tax, lower rates on realized capital gains, as well as deductions for interest payments and charitable contributions, reduced dramatically what otherwise looked like an extremely progressive tax schedule, with a top marginal tax rate on individual income of 91 percent.”
So the actualized income tax rate for the rich was 31%, not really much different from where it stands today. That is a most interesting point to come to terms with. Such results also show that Sandroids don’t actually know what they’re talking about when they claim that the United States had a 91% income tax rate.
“The greater progressivity of federal taxes in 1960, in contrast to 2004, stems from the corporate income tax and the estate tax. The corporate tax collected about 6.5 percent of total personal income in 1960 and only around 2.5 percent of total income today. Because capital income is very concentrated, it generated a substantial burden on top income groups. The estate tax has also decreased from 0.8 percent of total personal income in 1960 to about 0.35 percent of total income today. As a result, the burden of the estate tax relative to income has declined very sharply since 1960 in the top income groups.”
The true source of where the “1%” paid out comes to light. If you look at the current U.S. corporate tax rate, you will see that it is extremely high at 39.1%. Many progressives will also claim that many major corporations don’t pay any taxes. I really would like someone to tell me which of those evil corporations pays zero taxes. As for estate taxes, is there really a need to tax a citizen after he is dead?
“Second, the composition of top incomes has changed substantially. Figure 2 shows the breakdown into wage income, business income, capital income (including imputed corporate taxes), and realized capital gains. In the 1960s, top incomes were primarily composed of capital income: mostly dividends and capital gains. The surge in top incomes since the 1970s has been driven in large part by a steep increase in the labor income component, due in large part to the explosion of executive compensation. As a result, labor income now represents a substantial fraction of income at the top. This change in composition is important to keep in mind, because the corporate and estate taxes that had such a strong effect on creating progressivity in the 1960s would have relatively little effect on labor income.”
One of the other things that Progressives seem to forget about when discussing post WWII economic conditions is WWII. The United Kingdom had here cities heavily bombed and ended the war nearly bankrupt, France was occupied for four years and also suffered heavily; Germany lost millions, lost Prussia, and was rent in two; the Soviet Union lost 27 million people and had many of its cities decimated, the Chinese lost over 20 million fighting the Japanese and shortly thereafter underwent a Communist revolution; Japan lost millions, had its cities destroyed, and two nukes dropped on it. The only major power left without any massive loss of live or widespread destruction wrought in its homeland was the United States. The destruction of industrialized countries allowed the United States to produce the majority of the world’s economic output for a time without contest. When progressives say that the 1950s were a good time for the U.S. economy they have no understanding as to why.
Borrowed from Wikipedia
Keynesians think that war stimulates the economy right? Nothing said economic growth like the Nanking massacre!
Posted above is what a Facebook page called Americans against the Republican Party posted up about Socialist Insecurity. Based upon this meme you would almost think that progressives and fellow socialists actually believe in free choice instead of forcing fellow citizens to give up the majority of their income. Based upon how often the Democratic Party Presidential candidates talk about the 1%, taxing the rich, demanding that the Federal Government provide more, and their desire to turn the United States into a copy of Denmark I’m not certain I wouldn’t believe that though. Let’s take a look at some of the comments from the aforementioned Facebook page:
The comments are very revealing into what many progressives believe. The socialists are admitting that: they’re socialists, discuss why socialism is a good thing, think that the government will fix their problems, Rethuglicans are opposing the glorious coming of Next Tuesday™, and that progressives care about proles citizens. Don’t forget to talk about fighting for change some more either. Progressives care about you so much that they’ll take your income, give it to someone else, and then promise to pay you back with interest decades later. Obviously citizens can’t be trusted to save up their own money.
Are you ready for more Hope and Change comrade?
Plenty of people think that the Federal Government needs to provide even more for citizens and make things “free.” Going back to the Bernie Sanders’ article I linked to earlier:
“Health care in Denmark is universal, free of charge and high in quality. Everybody is covered as a right of citizenship. The Danish health care system is popular, with patient satisfaction much higher than in the United States. In Denmark, every citizen can choose a doctor in their area. Prescription drugs are inexpensive. ”
It’s interesting that socialists will claim that anything a government provides is free. Danish taxes include: income taxes (not including municipal, and others) starting off at about 38% for anyone making over 40,000 DKK (∼$7000 US), a national Value Added Tax of 25%,a 180% sales taxes on automobiles (some boast about it since citizens’ are forced into obedience concerning climate change), $2,000 fees just to get a Driver License, gas taxes over $4/G, and numerous other fees. Such taxes hardly qualify anything provided in Denmark as being “free” and of no expense to taxpayers. But hey, taking 2/3 or more of a citizens income and and controlling them is a socialist’s wet dream right? Even when the extreme taxes are pointed out to progressives, they’ll still call government programs free. No matter what you use to prove that extensive social programs require extensive taxes, they’ll simply reply back that the rich aren’t paying their fair share…
Back to the initial thrust of this post though; no matter what progressives say about Social Security, not everyone pays into it. For quite a large number of people, including Ida May Fuller (more on her later), almost nothing was contributed to the “Trust Fund.” Let’s look at what Michael Lind had to write in the New York Times article “Social Security as a Ponzi? It’s a Bad Metaphor“:
“Some critics of Social Security seem to equate it with a Ponzi scheme because the growth of payouts depends on growth of the number of future taxpayers, in the case of Social Security, or future investors, in the case of classic Ponzi schemes. By this definition, Social Security is a Ponzi scheme — and so are the private investment accounts that many conservatives propose as an alternative to Social Security. Whether the intermediary is the government or private money managers, in both cases the income of retirees will depend on money generated by the economic activity of succeeding generations in the work force. The main difference is that private investments are riskier than promises by the federal government of the United States to pay benefits to seniors who have paid payroll taxes all their lives.“
The author just admitted that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. I do not advocate for forcing people to put money in private investment accounts either. I simply believe that citizens shouldn’t forcefully have 6.2% (up to $118,500) of their paycheck deducted, nor should employers have to give up their 6.2% either. I feel as if I can manage money better than central government managers, but progressives can’t let people have freedom. They have to take your money for your own good.
“Social Security was partly pre-funded in 1983. This raised payroll taxes above immediate program costs in order to create a trust fund that lent money to the U.S. government, which must repay the trust fund as any other creditor would. Social Security will not become a pure pay-as-you-go system until 2036, according to the latest government estimates. Even then, there will be only a modest shortfall in benefits, which can be eliminated in advance by higher payroll taxes, permanent infusions of general revenue or other non-payroll taxes, or benefit reductions — or a combination of these reforms. A Social Security system funded purely by current taxes would no more be a Ponzi scheme than the U.S. military or the public school system.“
So the Federal Government can take money out of it and promise to pay it back? Sounds promising. The estimates he posted up are also not correct. I can’t verify what he actually linked to, it is now dead. Taking a look at a report by the Office of the Inspector General for the Social Security Administration’s 2014 Disability Insurance Trust Fund Informational Report reveals the following:
“The 2014 Trustees’ Annual Report has projected that the DI Trust Fund reserves will be depleted in the fourth quarter of 2016, and the combined OASI and DI Trust Funds would be depleted in 2033. Although the DI Trust Fund is estimated to be depleted in the fourth quarter of 2016, the Trustees have recommended that lawmakers address the projected Trust Fund shortfalls for the combined OASI and DI Trust Funds in a timely way to phase in necessary changes and give workers and beneficiaries time to adjust to them. Implementing changes soon would allow more generations to share in the needed revenue increases or reductions in scheduled benefits.“
For anyone who’s curious, DI refers to the Disability Insurance Trust Fund and OASI is Old-Age and Survivors Insurance program. The DI “Trust Fund” runs out of money in a year and once the program payments are combined money will run low in 2033. Isn’t interesting how these estimates keep growing shorter? Moving down to page 3, the document illustrates perfectly how Social Security is a pyramid scheme:
“Overall, OASDI costs will rise over the next 20 years as baby boomers retire and lower-birth-rate generations born after 1965 replace the population at working ages. The lower birth rates after 1965 caused a permanent shift in the population’s age distribution, with fewer workers supporting more retirees. Additionally, the baby boomer generation has moved from less disability-prone ages (25 to 44) to more disability prone ages (45 to 64). See Figure C–1 in Appendix C. This, along with other issues, has resulted in the flat projected number of workers per DI beneficiary for the future.“
The last paragraph in Mr. Lind’s piece must have been a joke, right?
“To paraphrase the late David Crockett — as a U.S. congressman from Tennessee, before he died in 1836 at the Alamo during the fight for the independence of Texas — Governor Perry’s claim that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme don’t make good sense. It don’t even make good nonsense.“
Something doesn’t make sense anyway. The fine fact-checkers over at PolitiFact Florida have declared any claims that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme to be false. Let’s take a look at why:
“The term originates with Charles Ponzi, a Boston swindler who conned investors out of millions in 1920 by promising returns of up to 100 percent in 90 days on investments in foreign postal coupons. After first-round investors harvested those profits, others flocked to Ponzi, unaware his ‘profits’ consisted of money paid in by other investors.
That strategy is unsustainable.
In contrast, Social Security is more like a ‘pay-as-you-go’ system transferring payroll tax payments by workers to retirees. A 2009 Social Security Administration online post stated: ‘The American Social Security system has been in continuous successful operation since 1935. Charles Ponzi’s scheme lasted barely 200 days.’”
It’s different from a Ponzi scheme because it’s lasted thus far. It’s different because rather than my own money coming back to me it’s going to someone else. What sound logic. Continuing on:
“Mitchell Zuckoff, a Boston University journalism professor who has written a book on Ponzi, noted three critical dissimilarities between Social Security and a Ponzi scheme. We will summarize Zuckoff’s comments from an earlier fact-check:
• ‘First, in the case of Social Security, no one is being misled,’ Zuckoff wrote in a January 2009 article in Fortune. ‘Social Security is exactly what it claims to be: A mandatory transfer payment system under which current workers are taxed on their incomes to pay benefits, with no promises of huge returns.’
• Second, he wrote, ‘A Ponzi scheme is unsustainable because the number of potential investors is eventually exhausted.’ While Social Security faces a huge burden due to retiring Baby Boomers, it can be and has been tweaked, and ‘the government could change benefit formulas or take other steps, like increasing taxes, to keep the system from failing.’
• Third, Zuckoff wrote, ‘Social Security is morally the polar opposite of a Ponzi scheme. … At the height of the Great Depression, our society (see ‘Social’) resolved to create a safety net (see ‘Security’) in the form of a social insurance policy that would pay modest benefits to retirees, the disabled and the survivors of deceased workers. By design, that means a certain amount of wealth transfer, with richer workers subsidizing poorer ones. That might rankle, but it’s not fraud.’”
I see why Social Security has lasted for decades now. You pay into the system or you get to go to prison for tax evasion. The journalism professor wrote that there’s no huge returns, even though the Democratic Presidential candidates keep claiming that they’re going to have the Federal Government give out more “free” stuff. It’s not fraud because you don’t have a choice. Yet more sound logic.
In PolitiFact’s own article they essentially admit that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme that forces you to pay rather than going out of business.
“Michael Tanner, an expert on Social Security at the libertarian Cato Institute says that Social Security and Ponzi schemes share some characteristics — for example, in the early stages there is a huge windfall while those later on get smaller returns.
However, Ponzi didn’t have the power of the federal government.
‘In the end the Ponzi scheme collapses and can’t make people continue to give him money, but Social Security can always force people to pay,’ Tanner said. ‘In theory Social Security can always go out and raise taxes to keep benefits flowing.’”
PolitiFact still rates the claim that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme as being false though:
“Curbelo said that Social Security and Medicare are ‘a Ponzi scheme.’
A Ponzi scheme is by definition an illegal crime and an unsustainable set-up that crashes very quickly. Social Security and Medicare, which have been around for decades, are not criminal schemes.
Both programs face the massive challenge of fewer workers paying for the benefits of current retirees, and budget experts say Congress could make changes to make them more sustainable in the future — though many politicians are reluctant to gamble with the support of current senior voters.
Curbelo raises a legitimate point about the need for reform, but that’s entirely different than calling these programs ‘Ponzi schemes.’
We rate this claim False.”
Social Security is legal because FDR did everything possible to circumvent the Constitution and pack the Supreme Court. Social Security is legal because you don’t have a choice. Progressives have some interesting ideas on freedom and what is illegal.
Conservativenuke's Weblog 