This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The "reserves" are treasury bills. The money that was collected was spent immediately.
I can't tell whether you're making a pedantic point about the payroll tax money is invested or are arguing against us having financial reserves to tap. In 1983 we reached a similar place where the trust funds were facing (much more) imminent deficits. Congress worked together and responded by both cutting benefits and raising contributions; in the years that followed we fixed the shortfall and built up accumulated surpluses (page 36) from all the boomers in the workforce. We've been currently spending down those surpluses for SS payouts but we aren't printing money or borrowing from elsewhere in the general fund (except for the marginal SSI fund).
Hey, we fixed it once, no reason we can't do it again.
A treasury is a reserve to entities other than the government, but it's not to the government itself. Another government's debt would be a reserve.
Everyone including the SSA themself refers to the trust fund's accumulated surpluses as reserves.
I can cut the tusk off a narwhal and call it a unicorn horn but that doesn't actually make it a unicorn horn.
If Apple Computer buys a US government bond or a Germand Bund it will receive money at some point in the future without any further action from itself. This is an actual reserve.
If Apple Computer issues a bond to Beats Audio (a company Apple Computer wholly owns), Beats will receive cash from Apple (conditional on the creditworthiness of the parent). So, when we consolidate these, they net to nothing. Apple owes just as much as Beats will recieve. From an outside perspective they fully cancel each other out and can be ignored. Apple will need to get the money elsewhere that pays Beats.
When the US government issues a bond to Social Security Administration. The US government owes just as much as Social Security will receive. So, when we consolidate these, they net to nothing. The US owes just as much as Social Security will recieve. From an outside perspective they fully cancel each other out and can be ignored. The US doesn't get to claim that it has a reserve via SSA. The US will still need to borrow (or tax) the money needed by Social Seurity in order to repay their debt.
If Social Security owned bonds issued by a non-US Government entity, those would be real reserves, since they should be able to expect the third party to give them money without any required action from another US government entity.
Everyone understands this, they're clearly talking about earmarked tax payments plus interest exceeding defined tax outlays. If you want to be precise and call it accumulated payroll tax receipts plus 6% of money the US government will pay on treasuries, you can, but who cares? This is a semantic argument that doesn't have implications for the fiscal operations of the trust funds.
It has a pretty important implication on the US governments fiscal operations as the balance declines though. That's a healthy amount of extra borrowing the US governemnt needs to do over the next decade or so.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link