Social Security: Reality

Jacob Hornberger writes:

All too many Americans simply do not wish to see the reality of Social Security. They’ve lived all their lives under myths, illusions, and delusions, mostly self-imposed. And many of them get furious when you confront them with reality. It’s easier to continue living under the myths, illusions, and delusions.

Reality: There is no Social Security fund. There never has been a fund. There never will be a fund. From the very beginning, Social Security has been just another socialistic welfare program, no different from food stamps or agricultural subsidies.

Reality: The government is not like a private business. It does not create wealth. It is also not a fountain of wealth. It does not have its own money. The only way it gets its money is by taking it away from people in the private sector.

Reality: Social Security is a straight, out-and-out, socialistic program. It’s not a coincidence that the Social Security administration has a bust of Otto von Bismarck on its website. He was known as the Iron Chancellor of Germany. He got the idea of Social Security from German socialists and then introduced it into Germany’s paternalistic, welfare-state way of life.

Reality: Social Security program is one of major factors that are heading America toward bankruptcy.

Reality: Young people are already having a terribly difficult time starting out in life, including buying a home and raising a family. Why in the world would any senior citizen desire to make life more difficult for young people, including their children and grandchildren and their friends by continuing to impose an enormous Social Security tax burden on them?

Seniors have the opportunity to do the right thing before they pass from this life. They have the opportunity to call for the repeal, not the saving, of Social Security. Many seniors don’t need the money anyway. Some will have to continue working, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, imagine the economic prosperity and job creation that would result from ending the enormous Social Security tax burden. Others will have to depend on their children or others for help.

What’s wrong with all that? Have Americans lost all their faith in the workings of a free society?

America’s experiment with socialism (as well as its experiment with military empire) has failed. America’s senior citizens should do the right thing and demand the repeal, not the reform, of Social Security. Repealing Social Security, the crown jewel of America’s welfare state, would help lead America out of its statist morass and put our nation back on the road of economic liberty, free markets, prosperity, sound money, voluntary charity, and a constitutionally limited-government republic.