i would still have to pay Social Security taxes, but i don't mind that at all; since it is not an entitlement program of any kind. and this little experiment in democracy known as the United States has already seen the terrible result of ignoring the elderly and unable to work. Social Security is easily the most successful program in our history - and it took a class-traitor who saw his own class for what it was to ram it down our throats.
Huh? Social Security is one of the two biggest entitlement programs, the other being Medicare.
I wouldn't classify those programs as "entitlement programs" to be honest. Both of them we pay into via taxes our entire lives, every paycheck. I don't think it's greedy to want to get those funds back out in our time of need.
Welfare, sure. Medicaid, sure. But SS and Medicare are on a slightly different tier.
EDIT: I'm not arguing that they don't need reform. I'm simply arguing that they aren't "entitlement programs" that's all.
the SS system doesn't even need reform. a little tweak or two for the next gen. what it REALLY needs is for the rest of the government to stop stealing from it - which they've been doing for a long time.
but you don't get out if you don't pay in. and survivors get some of what you paid in if you die before you collect, and they qualify. it was your money, after all.
you can argue that SS is coerced, if you like. it doesn't matter to me. i'm 60 years old, and my parents and grandparents saw starvation. screw that. we should treat our brothers and sisters decently - if they contribute during their lives.
and i suppose you could make the argument that the 'early adopters' made out like bandits - they got quite a lot, relatively, without putting as much in as the rest of us. sound like a familiar argument? care to make it? of course, they were all dead by WWII, so the point is moot. and besides, they built more of our country and its structure than any tinhorn carpetbagger.