Does Social Security benefit those people who it was supposedly designed to benefit?

Social Security was originally passed to provide retirement income to lower wage earners. The benefit structure, however, favors those people who don't need the money in retirement.


If your lifetime earnings don't allow any accumulation of wealth and you continue to work to make ends meet, you can forfeit some or all of your SS benefits.


On the other hand, people who acquire a comfortable nest egg can collect full benefits.


Isn't this a bit lopsided? Is the Social Security system not serving the people for whom it was initially designed? In reality, is the Social Security department just another tax revenue source for the government? Is there any reason why we should keep a system that doesn't serve its original purpose any longer?

Does Social Security benefit those people who it was supposedly designed to benefit?
Nope. Not even remotely.


We need to privatize retirement savings--it's ridiculous the way current SS payouts work!
Reply:I don't believe it is a case of a failed idea...but rather failure in management. Social Security is a vital necessity for any society, but the loopholes and the rules governing it in the US are preventing it from working the way that it should.
Reply:I don;t think that SS was ever designed to be a retirement program, but rather a form of socialized healthcare. My brother receives SSDI on account of his injury (totally and permanently disabled...quadriplegic) and privatizing it would cut him and several others off from being able to live. People shuld NOt look at it as a retirement program
Reply:I couldn't agree more. But think of how many would never take the initiative to save the money that's presently taken out of their paychecks for their own future? I'm guessing that millions upon millions wouldn't. Then what? Who foots the bill for their own short-sighted foolishness?





I'd love to take the percentage that is taken out of my own and invest it for my future.
Reply:Not if Bush keeps shoveling funds from it to pay for his tax cuts. :(
Reply:Bush had an excellent plan that was great for everybody. I would much rather have my money than the promise of social security, so Bush offering a choice of social security or keeping your money was great. Instead, we will keep pumping money into a pyramid scheme social program, counting on extreme population growth to fund what has turned into an insufficient retirement program, rather than what it was originally intended to be, as you described in your question..
Reply:Is there a correlation to this?
Reply:Sometimes, but I doubt it helps those all the time