Master stroke of titling. Nutshell if I ever saw one.

Nice graph, ID.

IslandDog

I am aware that there are shifting spending patterns. You sources have however not counted the interest on the debt paid to Medicare and Social security. There is little trick called NET interest. That only counts the interest paid to the debt held by the public and companies. However we also pay interest to the SS and Medicare Trust funds. If you count ALL the interest taxpayers are paying it MUCH higher then your graph. In fact the total interest is almost the same as defense spending. Thus if your graph used Total Interest the % paid to Interest would be about 17% compared with defense at 19%.

The second issue is Social Security. That is NOT a general Fund expense and is paid from the Social Security tax. Today the Social Security system is generating a surplus and in 2006 the Surplus from Social Security was almost $200 Billion and the Surplus from Medicare was about $26 Billion. Bush subtracts these two surpluses from that annual deficit to make the annual deficit appear much smaller. In 2006 Bush reported the annual deficit at $248 Billion but the Treasury shows the increase in the national Debt in 2006 as $574 Billion. That is the result of: $574 less the $226 Billion Surplus from SS and Medicare to arrive at the $248 billion. However we have issued IOU's to SS and Medicare upon which we pay interest and that distorts the deficit as reported by Bush the same as NET interest ignores all the debt held by SS and Medicare. As the Comptroller General said-- Smoke and Mirrors!

Just for the record there is no trust fund it was abolished in 1967 by the Congress in order to fund the LBJ great society which is the reason why SS is in so much trouble today.

Regardless of col trying to twist things the fact is America is already turning into a welfare state.

Paladin77

Where do you come up with this BS? There are two trust funds one for Social Security and one for Medicare. In fact about 6 months ago Bush toured the storage facility in VA where the IOU’s, issued by the Treasury that are the assets of the trust funds, are stored.

The issue is that what Bush has been doing is USING the surplus that BOTH SS and Medicare currently generates to fund his deficit and spending. Bush has used about a Trillion dollars of the SS and Medicare funds and issues Treasury IOU’s. When the day comes when the SS and Medicare NEED their money, the Treasury will be in a bit of a bind. They will be required to come up with the CASH to pay SS and Medicare to redeem those IOU’s. You are just about the most uninformed a person on this Blog site.

IslandDog

What I posted above is correct and has nothing to do with a welfare state!

The trustfunds have been abolished since the 60's too bad you don't bother to do any research, The money collected today does not go into a trust fund it goes to the treasury for disbursment with little left over. The funds that were in the trust fund were spent to pay for the Great Society and to pay for the Vietnam war. The congress issued IOU's that was supposed to be repaid after the vietnam war was over. The idea was to use the money saved from the war to repay the IOU's they used that money to pay for social programs. Congress never paid back the money, over the years the money hever found its way back into the no longer existing trust funds. Lots of fun pointing fingers at GWB but understand that the probelm started while democrats were in power both the house, senate and the white house. Only during Mr. Reagan had two years of slight control and that was it as far as control over all three branches of government. The rest of the time the republicans may have had the numbers but not the will to tell the other side that they were incharge. We missed our chance and the other side is in charge. FIx it!

Paladin 77

YOU ARE FULL OF BS. This is from the dept of the Treasury;



Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund
Updated November 21, 2005
Description of the fund The Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund is a separate account in the United States Treasury. A fixed proportion (dependent on the allocation of tax rates by trust fund) of the taxes received under the Federal Insurance Contributions Act and the Self-Employment Contributions Act are deposited in the fund to the extent that such taxes are not needed immediately to pay expenses. Taxes are deposited in the fund on every business day.
The trust fund provides automatic spending authority to pay monthly benefits to retired-worker (old-age) beneficiaries and their spouses and children and to survivors of deceased insured workers. With such spending authority, the Social Security Administration does not need to periodically request money from the Congress to pay benefits.

Funds not withdrawn for current expenses (benefits, the financial interchange with the Railroad Retirement program, and administrative expenses) are invested in interest-bearing Federal securities, as required by law; the interest earned is also deposited in the trust fund.

Establishment of fund The Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) Trust Fund was created pursuant to section 201 of the Social Security Act Amendments of 1939. These amendments also established a Board of Trustees. OASI became effective on January 1, 1940, and superseded the old-age reserve account established under the Social Security Act of 1935.
Trustees The Board of Trustees currently consists of 6 members, 4 of whom automatically serve by virtue of their positions in the Federal Government. These 4 are the
Secretary of the Treasury (the Managing Trustee),
Secretary of Labor,
Secretary of Health and Human Services, and
Commissioner of Social Security
The other 2 members are appointed by the President, and confirmed by the Senate, as required by the "Social Security Amendments of 1983." These 2 members serve 4-year terms.

Search


Statistical Tables
Trust Fund Data
Updated February 8, 2007

Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance Trust Funds, 1957-2006
[In millions] Assets
Calendar
year Total
receipts Total
expenditures Net increase
during year Assets at
end of year
1957 $8,090 $7,567 $523 $23,042
1958 9,108 8,907 201 23,243
1959 9,516 10,793 -1,277 21,966
1960 12,445 11,798 647 22,613
1961 12,937 13,388 -451 22,162
1962 13,699 15,156 -1,457 20,705
1963 16,227 16,217 10 20,715
1964 17,476 17,020 456 21,172
1965 17,857 19,187 -1,331 19,841
1966 23,381 20,913 2,467 22,308
1967 26,413 22,471 3,942 26,250
1968 28,493 26,015 2,479 28,729
1969 33,346 27,892 5,453 34,182
1970 36,993 33,108 3,886 38,068
1971 40,908 38,542 2,366 40,434
1972 45,622 43,281 2,341 42,775
1973 54,787 53,148 1,639 44,414
1974 62,066 60,593 1,472 45,886
1975 67,640 69,184 -1,544 44,342
1976 75,034 78,242 -3,209 41,133
1977 81,982 87,254 -5,272 35,861
1978 91,903 96,018 -4,115 31,746
1979 105,864 107,320 -1,456 30,291
1980 119,712 123,550 -3,838 26,453
1981 142,438 144,352 -1,914 24,539
1982 147,913 160,111 239 24,778
1983 171,266 171,177 89 24,867
1984 186,637 180,429 6,208 31,075
1985 203,540 190,628 11,088 42,163
1986 216,833 201,522 4,698 46,861
1987 231,039 209,093 21,946 68,807
1988 263,469 222,514 40,955 109,762
1989 289,448 236,242 53,206 162,968
1990 315,443 253,135 62,309 225,277
1991 329,676 274,205 55,471 280,747
1992 342,591 291,865 50,726 331,473
1993 355,578 308,766 46,812 378,285
1994 381,111 323,011 58,100 436,385
1995 399,497 339,815 59,683 496,068
1996 424,451 353,569 70,883 566,950
1997 457,668 369,108 88,560 655,510
1998 489,204 382,255 106,950 762,460
1999 526,582 392,908 133,673 896,133
2000 568,433 415,121 153,312 1,049,445
2001 602,003 438,916 163,088 1,212,533
2002 627,085 461,653 165,432 1,377,965
2003 631,886 479,086 152,799 1,530,764
2004 657,718 501,643 156,075 1,686,839
2005 701,758 529,938 171,821 1,858,660
2006 744,873 555,421 189,452 2,048,112 As of December 31, 2006 there is $2.048 Trillion in the Social Security Trust Fund in the form of U.S. Treasury Bonds!

>BR>
What Are the Trust Funds? The trust funds were created in the U.S. Treasury to account for all program income and disbursements. Social Security and Medicare taxes, premiums and other income are credited to the funds. Benefit payments and program administrative costs are the only purposes for which disbursements from the funds can be made.

Program revenues not needed in the current year to pay benefits and administrative costs are invested in special non-marketable securities of the U.S. Government on which a market rate of interest is credited. Thus, the trust funds represent the accumulated value, including interest, of all prior program annual surpluses and deficits, and provide automatic authority to pay benefits.

There are four separate trust funds. For Social Security, the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) Trust Fund pays retirement and survivors benefits, and the Disability Insurance (DI) Trust Fund pays disability benefits. (The combined trust funds are described as OASDI.) For Medicare, the Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund pays for inpatient hospital and related care. The Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund is composed of Part B, which pays for physician and outpatient services, and Part D, which provides the new prescription drug benefit. Medicare benefits are provided to most people age 65 and over and to most workers who are receiving Social Security disability benefits. Source Dept. of the Treasury!

Okay here is what I want you to do. Call the treasury and ask them how much money you have amassed in your social security account under your social security account number. Look at your card it says it is a social security account. The number is how they track your money. What they will tell you is how much money you will get per month and per year but not what was paid into the account. The reason why is because you will spend more than you have paid into the account if that is the case then the money paid you is not your money but someone else’s money. The trust fund still has the name trust fund but it is just a name not an actual fund where your money is kept.

What this means is the politicians have promised more money to you than you deserve in order to buy votes. They got the votes we get the shaft. At the same time the Congress years ago saw that the money paid into social security would not be enough to pay them they came up with the Thrift Savings Plan. I know becaue as a Government employee I am a member of the plan. Our President trying to fix the problem wants to offer the same program that Congress made for themselves and then offered to the rest of the government to the general public. It will stop the bleeding and because we have control over our money instead of the politicians that spent our savings on more social programs and a war they started then did not want to win, it would mean that money would be available for everyone. To do this all people age 50 an younger would be able to save enough money by age 65 to retire on. I know because that is what I am doing now. I can put up to 5000 extra a year. Great!

Paladin77

The trust funds are made up of Treasury Bonds. They are as much of an asset as any other Treasury obligations. If you buy an E-Bond or a Treasury bill what do you consider that to be? AN ASSET. It is true that when the Trustee of Medicare or Social Security comes to the Treasurer of the United States and needs to redeem these the treasury bonds that make up the trust funds, the Treasurer of the U.S. will either have to obtain the funds to redeem the bonds by selling new Treasury obligations to the public or there will have to be monies from tax revenue. If the funds come from taxes it would require a tax increase to provide the funds to redeem the bonds held in these trust funds.

That does not change the fact that there are trust funds made up of U.S. Treasury Bonds.

Right, the next tune you choose to dance to? Your account is empty the trust fund is a fund in name only. The Democrats blew one trillion dollars on social progarms in the 60's. our money was gone when we were just starting our careers and the people responsible have long since retired spent thier money and ours are most are dead so we can't even blame them now that the damage is coming to a head.

Paladin77

You are to stupid to live. I have PROVEN directly from the Treasury Web site that these trust funds do exist. They contain the same U.S. Treasury promises as the E-Bonds that Americans consider ASSETS. Bush has added over a Trillion dollars of IOU’s of the social security and Medicare surplus. You are either as dumb as a rock or just do not want to admit the truth!

I am getting tired of your insults without foundation. The point is that you fail to notice is that at one time the social security account number represented a personal account with your money in it. After 1967 it did not. You blame Mr. Bush for the failure of social security and I point out that the failure happened in 1967. you can play semantics but the meaning remains the same.

Paladin77

Anyone that is shown the facts, which I posted directly from the dept. of the Treasury and then continues to deny those facts is just DUMB!
The Trust funds do exist and Bush did add over a Trillion dollars of IOU’s to those Trust funds because of the budget deficit he created.

Paladin77

Anyone that is shown the facts, which I posted directly from the dept. of the Treasury and then continues to deny those facts is just DUMB!
The Trust funds do exist and Bush did add over a Trillion dollars of IOU’s to those Trust funds because of the budget deficit he created.