The time for talk is long past.
I would like to know how those of us that paid into Social Security for the past 40 years can get even a fraction of that money back.

Maybe the IRS will let us write it off as a loss...

@#1: No, the IRS will not let you write it off as a loss but they will give you one of the trillion IOU`s that have been stuffed in the SSI `lockbox` for the past 77 tears.

Privatize it. And instead of the fed buying mortgages print the money and give back what everybody has paid in - let them invest it as they see fit. The returns wouldn't be at all difficult to beat and their estate can then pass on to their children what's left.

The fed government is in a whole lot of businesses it shouldn't be in.

Anyone who calls it a "trust fund" is a co-conspirator, and should be jailed for same.

Nothing will happen as politicians will increase benefits, not reform benefits. And given our overwhelming debt, when Socialist Security does go bankrupt, there will be nothing that can save it. All the other cash will go to servicing our debt. This will be huge Greek tragedy made worse by our enemy, our goobernment.

Here's a fun and informative exercise: The SSA sends you every year a summary of what you paid in over the years (in my case since 1963). Add in your employer's contribution, and put the amounts in a spreadsheet. Now assume you invested that amount every year at an annual interest rate of 4 per cent every year on the balance. In my case it comes to about 2 million dollars.

The average SS retiree exhausts all of his own contributions within 3 years. After that he receives borrowed money which will eventually have to be paid back by younger private sector workers, and the percentage of younger private sector workers keeps dwindling. Collapse is a certainty, and it has been a certainty from the day SS was enacted. The surprising thing is how long it lasted. Collapse will mean an expansion of economic freedom.

One more time, listen careully. There is NO TRUST FUND!!!! Social Security is already paying out more than it takes in.

Our trusted government has handled the $$$ taken from me and my employer so well over the past 40+ years we certainly should entrust them with our healthcare.
This Ponzi scheme was never going to work and the jails should be overflowing with congressional and senatorial bandits and crooks. Madoff was a piker!

Sorry #1, but you and I have not paid into anything. That was the big lie from FDR. It is not, and has never been, an investment. Your money was a tax, always has been, and always will be. That is why they refer to it as "payroll taxes". Same for Medicare. It has all been spent!

This Ponzi scheme is nothing more than welfare for the elderly. If people are not saving for their own full retirement, they are in trouble. At some point (soon), this is going to all fall apart. If it happens after they retire, what are they going to do?

can

road

kick

The money was stolen from us. The amount we are to get is about 3 times less then what we would have gotten if it was invested like the people in Galveston, TX were able to do in the open market.

Congress closed that loophole back in the 1980's

Google: galveston texas social security

Read about how much was stolen from all of us. Congress exempted themselves and they get a very nice pension and benefits for stealing from the American people.