And this was BEFORE the trillions of $$$ the Iraq War will cost the
taxpayers was factored in. Wonder how many of the patriotic old timers
will reject their handouts for the good of the the country? Of course
none will because they are hypocrites.

Granny and Gramps put your adult diapers on and your dentures in
backwards and bite yourself. And one other thing - SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES before any more of you senile assholes drives
your car through another store front or school yard and blames it on a
"stuck accelerator". Better yet, do society a favor and kill yourself.

The Looming National Benefit Crisis

By Dennis Cauchon and John Waggoner, USA TODAY

The long-term economic health of the United States is threatened by
$53 trillion in government debts and liabilities that start to come
due in four years when baby boomers begin to retire. (Related graphic:
U.S. economy threatened by aging of America)

The "Greatest Generation" (ha! ha!) and its baby-boom children have
promised themselves benefits unprecedented in size and scope. Many
leading economists say that even the world's most prosperous economy
cannot fulfill these promises without a crushing increase in taxes -
and perhaps not even then.

Neither President Bush nor John Kerry is addressing the issue in
detail as they campaign for the White House.

A USA TODAY analysis found that the nation's hidden debt - Americans'
obligation today as taxpayers - is more than five times the $9.5
trillion they owe on mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other
personal debt.

This hidden debt equals $473,456 per household, dwarfing the $84,454
each household owes in personal debt.

The $53 trillion is what federal, state and local governments need
immediately - stashed away, earning interest, beyond the $3 trillion
in taxes collected last year - to repay debts and honor future
benefits promised under Medicare, Social Security and government
pensions. And like an unpaid credit card balance accumulating
interest, the problem grows by more than $1 trillion every year that
action to pay down the debt is delayed.

"As a nation, we may have already made promises to coming generations
of retirees that we will be unable to fulfill," Federal Reserve
Chairman Alan Greenspan told the House Budget Committee last month.
(Related story: Americans' views on the benefit quandary)

Greenspan and economists from both political parties warn that the
nation's economy is at risk from these fast-approaching costs. If
action isn't taken soon - when baby boomers are still working and
contributing payroll taxes- the consequences may be catastrophic, some
economists say.

The worst-case scenario is a sudden crisis - perhaps a major terrorist
attack or a shutoff of oil from the Middle East - that triggers a loss
of confidence by investors in the U.S. economy. Foreign investors
refuse to lend more money to the government to finance its deficits;
drastic tax increases and benefit cuts occur suddenly; the dollar's
value plummets, which raises the cost of imported goods; and a severe
recession or depression results from falling incomes.

A softer landing: The USA acts swiftly and becomes more like Europe.
Taxes are higher, retirement benefits are less generous but widely
distributed; health care costs are controlled; and the economy is
sound but less productive.

Big payments on the debt start coming due in 2008, when the first of
78 million baby boomers - the generation born from 1946 to 1964 -
qualify at age 62 for early retirement benefits from Social Security.
The costs start mushrooming in 2011, when the first boomers turn 65
and qualify for taxpayer-funded Medicare.

Early warning signs

But Americans needn't wait until 2008 or 2011 to see firsthand the
escalating costs of these benefit programs. Medicare last month
announced the largest premium increase in the program's 39-year
history. In 2004 alone, federal spending on Medicare and Social
Security will increase $45 billion, to $789 billion. That one-year
increase is more than the $28 billion budget of the Department of
Homeland Security.

Many economists say a failure to confront the nation's debt promptly
will only delay the inevitable.

"The baby boomers and the Greatest Generation are delivering an
economic disaster to their children," says Laurence Kotlikoff, a
Boston University economist and co-author of The Coming Generational
Storm, a book about the national debt. "We should be ashamed of
ourselves."

USA TODAY used official government numbers to compute what the burden
means to the average American household. To pay the obligations of
federal, state and local government:

· All federal taxes would have to double immediately and permanently.
A household earning $100,000 a year would see its federal taxes double
from an average of about $20,000 to $40,000 a year. All state taxes
would have to increase 20% immediately and permanently.

· Or, benefits for Social Security, Medicare and government pensions
would have to be slashed in half immediately and permanently. Social
Security checks would be cut from an average of $1,500 per month for
couples to $750. Military pensions would drop from an average of
$1,782 per month to $891. Medicare spending would fall from $7,500 to
$3,750 annually per senior. The Medicare prescription-drug benefit
enacted last year would be canceled.

·Or, a combination of tax hikes and benefit cuts - such as a 50%
increase in taxes and a 25% reduction in benefits - would avoid the
extremes but still require painful changes that are outside the scope
of today's political debate. Savings also could come in the form of
price controls on prescription drugs, raising retirement ages and
limiting benefits to the affluent.

Every solution has the potential to damage the economy by reducing
disposable income or diverting economic resources.

The estimates computed by USA TODAY are similar to ones by government
watchdog agencies such as the Congressional Budget Office and the
Government Accountability Office and respected think tanks such as the
conservative American Enterprise Institute, the liberal Brookings
Institution and the non-partisan Urban Institute.

"Political leaders know this is a big problem," says Glenn Hubbard,
chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers for President Bush from
2001 to 2003. "I know the president is keenly aware. But in an
election year, it's not easy to talk about. The solutions may be very
painful. If he is re-elected, I think he will make this a top priority
next year. I hope so."

"Economists agree this cannot go on," says Joseph Stiglitz, President
Clinton's chief economic adviser from 1995 to 1997. "We can borrow and
borrow, but eventually there will be a day of reckoning."

Economist James Galbraith of the University of Texas in Austin is a
rare optimist in this debate. "I'm not at all concerned about Medicare
or Social Security," Galbraith says. "Unless the government goes
broke, Medicare isn't going to go broke, and the U.S. government isn't
going to go broke because it can print money."

Galbraith says the country can handle higher tax rates, as Europeans
do, and can save money by cutting spending elsewhere, such as on
defense, and by implementing a Canadian-style health care system that
uses private doctors and hospitals but has the government set prices
and pay the bills.

"We are an enormously rich country," he says. "Providing health care
and a modest living for our elderly is certainly something we can
afford."

An aging population

Social Security was created in 1935 to help the elderly avoid poverty
during the Great Depression. Medicare was established in 1965 to
provide health care for the elderly, who were finding it increasingly
difficult to afford medical care. But the aging of America and a
declining birth rate have put these programs on a collision course
with financial reality.

When the government set 65 as the retirement age in the 1930s, most
people didn't live that long. But life expectancy for women has
increased from 66 to 80 since 1940 and for men from 61 to 75.

Meanwhile, the birth rate has dropped from 25 births per 1,000
residents in the 1950s to just 15 today. The lower birth rate
ultimately means fewer workers paying taxes to finance Social Security
and Medicare benefits for the rapidly growing population of people 65
and over.

Medicare has had about 3.3 workers paying taxes for every recipient
for the past 30 years. Baby boomer retirements will reduce that to
just two workers supporting every Medicare recipient in 2040.

Immigration has helped offset some of the decline in birth rates. But
immigration rates would have to increase by five or 10 times - above
the recent peak of 1.2 million in 2001, legal and illegal - to provide
enough workers and their payroll taxes to boost Medicare.

Medicare recipients are growing older and more expensive, too. Annual
medical costs for an 85-year-old are double those of a 65-year-old.
Federal spending per Medicare recipient will average $7,500 this year.
The official projection for 2050: $26,683 per recipient in 2004
dollars.

A problem in plain view

The scope of the problem is no secret in Washington.

Medicare and Social Security trustees report the obvious every year:
The system has no way to pay for itself, even under the rosiest
scenarios. The Congressional Budget Office regularly updates Congress
on the liabilities.

Bush's budget for the fiscal year that began Friday spells out the
numbers in detail and concludes, "These long-term budget projections
show clearly that the budget is on an unsustainable path."

Comptroller General David Walker, the government's chief accountant,
travels the nation warning of the impending crisis. "I am desperately
trying to get people to understand the significance of this for our
country, our children, our grandchildren," Walker says. "How this is
resolved could affect not only our economic security but our national
security. We're heading to a future where we'll have to double federal
taxes or cut federal spending by 50%."

But documentation of the problem hasn't prompted political action to
address it. The $4.2 trillion national debt has generated some debate
in Congress and the presidential campaign. But the government's
obligations for Medicare and Social Security are 10 times the size of
the national debt.

"We have instructed our politicians not to tell us about this
problem," says Boston University economist Kotlikoff. "If they even
mention cuts to Social Security, we vote them out of office."

Grim financial statement

To bring attention to the problem, USA TODAY prepared a consolidated
financial statement for taxpayers, similar to what corporations give
shareholders. The newspaper totaled federal, state and local
government liabilities, taken from official documents.

Key findings:

·Total hidden debt. Federal, state and local governments today have
debts and "unfunded liabilities" of $53 trillion, or $473,456 per
household. An unfunded liability is the difference, valued in today's
dollars, between what current law requires the government to pay and
what current law provides in projected tax revenue.

·Social Security. The retirement program has $12.7 trillion in
obligations it cannot meet for current workers and retirees at the
current Social Security tax rate.

·Medicare. The health care program has a $30 trillion unfunded
liability for people now in the system as workers or beneficiaries.
The $30 trillion reflects the value today of the more than $200
trillion in deficits over 75 years to cover current workers and
retirees at existing levels of benefits, tax rates and premiums.
Medicare's new prescription-drug benefit, which starts in 2006,
accounts for $6.9 trillion of the program's financial ill health.

How much is $30 trillion? The gross domestic product, the entire
economic output of the USA, was $11 trillion last year.

"These numbers are staggering in their magnitude," says economist
Thomas Saving, whom Bush appointed as a public trustee on the Medicare
and Social Security board. "But when I testify before Congress, I'm
the only one saying, 'We have a funding problem.' Everyone else is
testifying for more benefits."

Like a home mortgage

The $53 trillion in liabilities is like a mortgage balance: That's
what it would cost to pay off the debt now. The actual cost would be
higher because of interest payments. A $100,000 mortgage at 5%
interest, for example, actually requires $193,000 in income to repay
over 30 years.

Under corporate accounting rules, a corporation would record a
$100,000 liability on its books if it promised to pay $193,000 in
medical benefits over 30 years. That liability would reduce profits
immediately, when the promise was made, although the money would be
paid over 30 years. Otherwise, shareholders could be fooled into
thinking that the company was better off than it really was.

In fact, the company had committed $193,000 in future revenue - worth
$100,000 today - to a retiree and couldn't use the money for
shareholder profits.

Government doesn't follow this accounting rule. If it did, the federal
deficit in 2004 would be $8 trillion, not $422 billion. The $8
trillion reflects the value of new financial obligations Congress
approved without any way to pay for them,plus the year's operating
deficit.

Government accounting rules are more lenient because, unlike a
business, Congress can take whatever money it needs through taxes and
renege on promises by passing new laws. Theoretically, the president
and Congress could end all health care for the elderly tomorrow and
cease Social Security payments the next day - or double or triple tax
rates to pay the bills.

That's why AARP, a non-partisan lobbying group for people over 50,
says the unfunded promises of Medicare and Social Security are less
worrisome than they appear.

"The reason we make companies fund their pension liabilities is
because it's uncertain they'll be around in the future. That doesn't
apply to government," says John Rother, AARP's research director. "The
size of the liabilities isn't relevant, nor is how much we put aside
today. What matters is how healthy will the economy be in the future."

He agrees that Medicare has a long-term funding problem but says the
nation's entire health system is the issue, not Medicare.

Alan Auerbach, director of the Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public
Finance at the University of California-Berkeley, says people are
understandably skeptical about gloomy predictions. But he says these
numbers are not guesses.

"We can't predict major wars or major inventions," he says. "But we do
know the baby boomers aren't going to disappear. We know pretty well
that health care costs will rise because of new technology. I wish
these were worst-case scenarios, but they're rather cautious best
guesses. It could be much worse."

A bill coming due

The heart of the problem is that the Greatest Generation and baby
boomers have promised themselves retirement benefits so generous - and
have contributed so little to financing them - that even the most
prosperous economy in history cannot pay the bill.

Consider a married couple who throughout their lives earned the median
income - the amount at which half of Americans make more and half make
less - and who will retire at age 65 next year. They earned $46,400 in
their final year of work.

Mr. and Mrs. Median would get a joint Medicare benefit valued at
$283,500, the Urban Institute estimates. That's the present value of
the benefit - what it's worth today - not the larger amount the
government will actually pay over the years. But the couple would have
paid only $43,300 in Medicare taxes (valued in 2004 dollars).
Taxpayers lose $240,200 on the deal.

But the Medians' good fortune doesn't end there. They also qualify for
$22,900 in annual Social Security benefits, which rise annually with
inflation.

Present value of the Social Security benefit: $326,000. Present value
of Social Security taxes paid over a lifetime: $198,000.

Net loss to taxpayers: $128,000.

And the situation is worse than that. The federal government didn't
save the money that the Medians paid in Medicare and Social Security
taxes. It spent that money as it came in on other things - defense,
education, past Medicare costs, etc. So the Social Security and
Medicare taxes paid by Mr. and Mrs. Median won't help offset the cost
of their benefits. The Social Security and Medicare trust funds have
no money, only IOUs that other taxpayers must repay.

"These mythical trust funds are a financial oxymoron - they can't be
trusted and they aren't funded," says Peter Peterson, a businessman
and Commerce secretary under President Nixon who wrote the best seller
Running on Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are
Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do About It.

Because the trust funds have been spent, taxpayers must come up with
the full $609,500 that Mr. and Mrs. Median are entitled to under
Medicare and Social Security. And the Medians are a bargain compared
with what their 45-year-old children will cost.

Social Security is structured so that future generations get
increasingly large benefits. And Medicare benefits rise with soaring
health care costs.

The Medians' children would receive Social Security and Medicare
benefits with a present value of $884,000 in 2004 dollars when they
turn 65, according to the Urban Institute. That's 45% more than their
parents would get.

For Hubbard, now dean of the Columbia Business School in New York, the
stakes are clear: "The question is whether the political process will
make gradual changes or we'll wait for a crisis."

Contributing: Paul Overberg, Bruce Rosenstein

On Sep 26, 9:52 pm, wrote:
And this was BEFORE the trillions of $$$ the Iraq War will cost the
taxpayers was factored in. Wonder how many of the patriotic old timers
will reject their handouts for the good of the the country? Of course
none will because they are hypocrites.

Granny and Gramps put your adult diapers on and your dentures in
backwards and bite yourself. And one other thing - SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES before any more of you senile assholes drives
your car through another store front or school yard and blames it on a
"stuck accelerator". Better yet, do society a favor and kill yourself.


- - - Deleted the Cut and Paste Off-Topic Rant - - -

(OT) : One More Off-Topic "MOH-Rant-&-Rage-Message" - Ho Hum !

wrote:

And this was BEFORE the trillions of $$$ the Iraq War will cost the
taxpayers was factored in. Wonder how many of the patriotic old timers
will reject their handouts for the good of the the country? Of course
none will because they are hypocrites.

Granny and Gramps put your adult diapers on and your dentures in
backwards and bite yourself. And one other thing - SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES before any more of you senile assholes drives
your car through another store front or school yard and blames it on a
"stuck accelerator". Better yet, do society a favor and kill yourself.

The Looming National Benefit Crisis

By Dennis Cauchon and John Waggoner, USA TODAY

The long-term economic health of the United States is threatened by
$53 trillion in government debts and liabilities that start to come
due in four years when baby boomers begin to retire. (Related graphic:
U.S. economy threatened by aging of America)

The "Greatest Generation" (ha! ha!) and its baby-boom children have
promised themselves benefits unprecedented in size and scope. Many
leading economists say that even the world's most prosperous economy
cannot fulfill these promises without a crushing increase in taxes -
and perhaps not even then.

Neither President Bush nor John Kerry is addressing the issue in
detail as they campaign for the White House.

Wake up! Neither George Bush nor John 'Fraud' Kerry are campaigning for the
White House.

On Sep 27, 12:52 am, wrote:



SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES


Got me a special Old Folks Drivers License;


Picked it up at a Street fair

has a map of all the street fairs All Over The Country;

- just Drive right up.. Free parking too !

Gotta go now, Doctors Appointment..


Yep,

You just keep working.. have a nice day . .

wrote:

Granny and Gramps put your adult diapers on and your dentures in
backwards and bite yourself. And one other thing - SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES before any more of you senile assholes drives
your car through another store front or school yard and blames it on a
"stuck accelerator". Better yet, do society a favor and kill yourself.

Are -you- planning on NOT getting old? Are you going to kill -yourself-
if you do get old?

What's your point?

Zeke Zzzppt wrote:

wrote:

Granny and Gramps put your adult diapers on and your dentures in
backwards and bite yourself. And one other thing - SURRENDER YOUR
****ING DRIVERS LICENSES before any more of you senile assholes drives
your car through another store front or school yard and blames it on a
"stuck accelerator". Better yet, do society a favor and kill yourself.

Are -you- planning on NOT getting old?

It's pretty hard for a 6th grader to think about getting old.

dxAce
Michigan
USA

wrote:

And this was BEFORE the trillions of $$$ the Iraq War will cost the
taxpayers was factored in. Wonder how many of the patriotic old timers
will reject their handouts for the good of the the country? Of course
none will because they are hypocrites.

SNIP
and *what* does this drivel have to do with rec.radio.shortwave?

On Sep 27, 8:09 am, dxAce wrote:

Are -you- planning on NOT getting old?

It's pretty hard for a 6th grader to think about getting old.


Yep. Oh if we could only see it....

What do you want to bet this guy will be screaming among the loudest
in 50 years should anyone suggets reducing HIS benefits ?!!

No one under 30 has anything sensical to say.

On Sep 27, 12:52 am, wrote:
And this was BEFORE the trillions of $$$ the Iraq War will cost the
taxpayers was factored in. Wonder how many of the patriotic old timers
will reject their handouts for the good of the the country? Of course
none will because they are hypocrites.



Once you realize that moh's home is alt.usenet.kooks and that his
principal skill is copying portions of long articles to many news
groups it becomes obvious he is just another troll.

The article is not new news and in USA fashion they miss a lot of key
points.