Maybe you all should go back to citing blog quotes after all?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I'm having a hard time getting what your problem is. Can you point me to figures showing things the way you see them (i.e., with the right measures of cost)?

He thinks your chart understates the cost of social security because it doesn't include the repayment of bonds held by the SS trust fund (the $4.6T) which would presumably included in debt service.

I don't know if he's right, because I don't know if the "spending" shown for social security is the total cost of benefits or merely spending that isn't redemption of the trust fund bonds. I don't care enough to look, and the fact that Cletus has made this point several times leads me to believe that he has.

If it's not the total cost of SS benefits, including trust fund redemptions, it's highly misleading in the way Cletus says.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Cletus Miller

And $4.6T, even over 20 years, is not a significant part of the GDP how?

Actually, when you put it that way, no. Over 20 years, that's about 1.5% of GDP a year.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Adder

He thinks your chart understates the cost of social security because it doesn't include the repayment of bonds held by the SS trust fund (the $4.6T) which would presumably included in debt service.

I don't know if he's right, because I don't know if the "spending" shown for social security is the total cost of benefits or merely spending that isn't redemption of the trust fund bonds. I don't care enough to look, and the fact that Cletus has made this point several times leads me to believe that he has.

If it's not the total cost of SS benefits, including trust fund redemptions, it's highly misleading in the way Cletus says.

If that's the issue, it turns on whether you think that we aren't really paying for Social Security expenses now because we bought bonds from ourselves and put them in a separate notional account. I understand that partisans on either side tend to ignore or emphasize the Trust Fund's accounting depending on whether or not it's useful to their story, but I don't think that's what's going on here. I tend to think it's a non-issue for these purposes because the scare stories I see about Social Security usually rely on including Medicare and Medicaid to imply that Social Security is causing budget imbalances, when in fact the problem is health expenses. I can believe that Social Security will grow somewhat as a percentage of of GNP, and think that's what the chart shows. But the effect is not huge, and the effect of Medicare and Medicaid costs is.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If that's the issue, it turns on whether you think that we aren't really paying for Social Security expenses now because we bought bonds from ourselves and put them in a separate notional account.

We aren't paying for them now. We owe the money to ourselves, and the redemption of that money will be paid for out of future taxes and/or borrowing.

I tend to think it's a non-issue for these purposes because the scare stories I see about Social Security usually rely on including Medicare and Medicaid to imply that Social Security is causing budget imbalances

Right, but Cletus is saying it is an issue, for a different reason, and he isn't lumping it together with those things.

[Cletus Miller]

Originally Posted by Adder

Actually, when you put it that way, no. Over 20 years, that's about 1.5% of GDP a year.

And the chart Ty keeps using show SS's total cost as--at maximum--about 5-6% of GDP, so it is understating the true cost of SS by 20 to 40%.

And, if you don't think a $4.6T ON BUDGET inter-generational wealth transfer is meaningful because it's happening over 20 years, Penske has some assisted care facilities to sell you.

And, if it's no big deal, why do they exclude it? SS *will* be a much bigger piece of GDP over the next 20 years than it will be thereafter. That chart doesn't show it that way, and it's because it doesn't fit the narrative the chart makers want to tell.

[Cletus Miller]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I can believe that Social Security will grow somewhat as a percentage of of GNP, and think that's what the chart shows.

After the trust fund is exhausted, SS *drops* as a percent of GNP. I have no issue with the accuracy of it once it flatlines, it is the specific exclusion of the bulge before that time that bothers me.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Cletus Miller

After the trust fund is exhausted, SS *drops* as a percent of GNP.

I don't know why that would be the case. All the boomers die off?

[Cletus Miller]

Originally Posted by Adder

I don't know why that would be the case. All the boomers die off?

No, then SS needs to rely exclusively on then-current FICA collections, which are projected to require an approx 20% cut in benefits from the current schedule. And will represent about 5-6% of GDP, as a fixed number.

It's the same sort of current law, current growth assumption that gives us the Ms costing 1/3 (or whatever) of GDP in 2075.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Cletus Miller

And the chart Ty keeps using show SS's total cost as--at maximum--about 5-6% of GDP, so it is understating the true cost of SS by 20 to 40%.

And, if you don't think a $4.6T ON BUDGET inter-generational wealth transfer is meaningful because it's happening over 20 years, Penske has some assisted care facilities to sell you.

And, if it's no big deal, why do they exclude it? SS *will* be a much bigger piece of GDP over the next 20 years than it will be thereafter. That chart doesn't show it that way, and it's because it doesn't fit the narrative the chart makers want to tell.

I don't think the CBO is pushing a narrative, though it's entirely possible that people are taking CBO data to do so. I'm open to the idea that Social Security will create imbalances, though I'm suspicious of such claims because there are many hacks pushing their own narrative there, and in any event I don't think the effect is comparable to that of healthcare costs.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I don't think the CBO is pushing a narrative, though it's entirely possible that people are taking CBO data to do so. I'm open to the idea that Social Security will create imbalances, though I'm suspicious of such claims because there are many hacks pushing their own narrative there, and in any event I don't think the effect is comparable to that of healthcare costs.

this is in cletus's wheelhouse- I guess I am not sure how you feel comfortable arguing with him..... unless, did you have a job in SS back in the day?

[LessinSF]

Won't re-beat a re-dead horse too much, but Randy Barnett's most recent post on Volokh is interesting, in part (cue Ty's learned and lucid):

Professor Fried forthrightly denied there were any constitutional limits on the power of Congress to mandate economic activity. In his testimony, he said Congress could mandate that everyone to buy gym memberships, or broccoli. He merely denied it could not make you go to the gym or eat the broccoli it made you buy, presumably because it would violate what he called the “Liberty Clause” of the Constitution. Again, this was to assert rather than deny that the Commerce and Necessary and Proper Clauses are, in and of themselves, unlimited. That was both his and Professor Dellinger’s position. When coupled with the Necessary and Proper Clause, on their reading the power of Congress “to regulate commerce . . . among the several states” in itself is without any limit.

This may be the case post-Raich, but it makes me yearn for my German passport.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by LessinSF

Won't re-beat a re-dead horse too much, but Randy Barnett's most recent post on Volokh is interesting, in part (cue Ty's learned and lucid):


This may be the case post-Raich, but it makes me yearn for my German passport.

Have you checked out the German health care system?

[Ty@50]

can't remember which of you was so bothered by the looting at the Baghdad museum, which none of us ever had a chance to visit.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Ty@50

can't remember which of you was so bothered by the looting at the Baghdad museum, which none of us ever had a chance to visit.

That's depressing, and I've been to that museum. I remember seeing the second stolen item.

It's a huge museum, though, with thousands if not millions of artifacts, so it could have been far worse (or perhaps will be when a fuller inventory is done).

[Sidd Finch]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If that's the issue, it turns on whether you think that we aren't really paying for Social Security expenses now because we bought bonds from ourselves and put them in a separate notional account.

How can you believe that we are paying for future Social Security expenses now? The bonds are worthless if we don't pay them back later.