Interesting. On the one hand, posters assert there is no separate Social Security fund. THat the "lockbox" the Congress stuffed full of IOUs to fund other social programs (welfare, food stamps, subsidized housing) never existed and that those funds were always part of the general fund. Just another tax.
On the other hand, it is asserted that the billions being spent on providing the services the alleged 'lockbox' was raided for, now to millions of illegal aliens, as well as the usual suspects and their great grandchildren and every generation between, have no effect on the solvency of the program the money was stolen from.
If there is/was no separate fund, then anything taken from the budget to pay for something else is, in fact raiding funds which could go to pay back the Social Security/medicare payments. No way it doesn't have an effect, because trillions have gone down the proverbial rathole to subsidize poverty, supporting some with services that those footing the bill for decades have only intermittently been able to secure for themselves out of what is left when the government is done sucking the life out of a paycheck.
Look at your social security card. Does it say "
For social security and tax purposes only--not for identification" on it? Mine does. I understand the newer ones don't say that.
But the older ones do, and I must ask: Why differentiate between Social Security and tax purposes if the two are just the same?
The answer, of course is that they are not. The government in the 1960s would not have bothered to differentiate if Social Security was 'just another tax' to be spent however it pleased, and it wasn't until someone in Congress came up with the whole IOU angle to raid the funds to spend more money than would have been available without running a deficit that the cards got changed, and the lines blurred.
According to the HHS' figures over 487 billion go to Medicaid and CHIP services.
Another 460 billion, to interest on the National Debt, for perspective, from the Treasury Dept.
That isn't Social Security.
The SSA is a whole different Agency. To be sure, the budget for the SSA approaches 1 trillion dollars, but again, people paid into it, continue to do so, whether young and just starting work, or whether they've been working for decades. Congress raided it to buy votes, and hasn't paid 'the fund' back. Increasingly, seniors are continuing to work, and ironically, paying into the fund even as they collect benefits.
As for just another tax, please explain why social security earnings (for the purpose of levying the tax) have a cap, when there is no cap on taxable earnings for income taxes. You could make $300K, and be taxed on most of that for income tax purposes, but only pay Social Security tax on a fraction of that (approaching half, now). Granted, that cap is a moving target, and goes up every year, but why have a cap at all if it is just another tax?
If you die, like my wife did before collecting any benefits, your benefits will be limited to the paltry "death benefit" Social Security pays out. (Not enough to pay for a decent container for your loved one's ashes, much less a funeral or coffin.) Nothing else is guaranteed.
Although Medicaid and Medicare are lumped together pretty often in budget numbers, kindly keep in mind that Medicare Part B is not free, and that if one really wants good coverage you find an Advantage plan, Parts C and D, or similar coverage on your own. While the cost may be reduced compared to full on health insurance, you have been picking up the tab all along.
That budget doesn't include Indian Health (feather not dot), which thankfully picked up all but a very small fraction of the hospital bills associated with my wife's passing.
But Indian Health is a
treaty obligation, not an "entitlement". Six million acres of shortgrass prairie and prime farmland 'bought' that. The tribe got screwed out of another four million acres later.
My point, though, is that administrative agencies for Social Security and other "entitlements" are separate. The one group is administered by HHS, the other by the SSA. Given the inertia of Federal Agencies, it is apparent that the two are not the same, nor were intended to be, otherwise, one (SSA) would have been absorbed by another agency, or absorbed the functions of the other entitlements.
The key problem is that those on Capitol Hill have been playing fast and loose with our money for decades, neither exercising fiscal restraint, nor abstaining from purchasing votes with the money they spend. This leads to inefficiency, waste, fraud, and outright theft. Had that restraint been employed where there were no obligations to provide funding, be it research grants, funding universities with huge endowments, waste in government contracts (especially DOD, but others as well) and the half a trillion every year shelled out to the 'poor' who neither work for that money and benefits, nor pay into those programs, and include the illegal aliens being imported into America in record numbers.
According to
https://balancingeverything.com/welfare-statistics/55% of non-citizen households in the USA used one or more welfare programs in 2018.
In comparison, only 32% of native households participated in welfare programs in the same year. Also, the immigrants on welfare statistics point to significantly higher use of food assistance programs among non-citizen households. Namely, 39% of these households needed food assistance compared to 19% of native households. Immigrant households that have lived in the USA for more than ten years participate more (50%) in welfare programs. By contrast, about 44% of those who moved to the country within the last ten years receive governmental assistance.
I'd say that makes a dent. The only Social Security non-citizens qualify for is SSI.
From the cited source,
The largest share of SSI funds in August 2022 went to the visually impaired and disabled.
Out of $4,982,125 paid in SSI in August 2022, 88.6% went to the visually impaired and disabled eligibility category. Welfare statistics show that people from this category received a total of $4,414,744 against $567,381 that went to the aged. In the United States, most people who receive public assistance are aged 18–64. This age group got a total of $2,997,752. Americans aged 65 or older received $1,194,039 in SSI funds, while the remaining $790,333 went to those under 18.
It did not differentiate between citizen and alien.
There are lots of places to bring the budget in line without reducing Social Security benefits, and one would be to deny them to non citizens, another, to raise the earnings cap on the tax.
But there are lots of sacred cows in the Federal budget that could be led to market before cutting Social Security to those who have their qualifying number of work years paid in.
