What is Social Security really? Different people, without dishonest intent, will give multiple and contradictory answers.
Is Social Security a Ponzi scheme, an investment, insurance, or the arbitrary grant from government that can be changed at the Congress’ whim? Which do you think, and why are the alternatives wrong?
Getting past the conflicting descriptions, at its root, Social Security is the transfer of money from the productive young to the idle and relatively wealthy old. Even supposed “trust funds” are actually IOUs to be paid by the currently productive.
While many focus on this wealth transfer aspect (from the relatively poor but productive young to the idle old), I want to point to a different aspect related to the collectivization of intergenerational support, and its enforced duty.
Traditionally, prior to government intervention, the elderly were taken care of within the family, mostly by their own children. Meanwhile, those elderly who were not wealthy yet able bodied and able minded continued to work to support themselves.
During the Great Depression, government policies blocked Americans’ ability to trade and contract freely, which led to individuals not being able to support themselves much less family members. Instead of ending such disastrous economic interventions, government imposed a duty on those with jobs to support everybody else’s infirmed elderly, widowed, and orphaned family members; that program was called Social Security.
Note: previously, by choice and voluntary association, individuals had engaged in support of deserving others without sacrifice. The new government policy was that such support be involuntary, directed to unknown others regardless of the recipient’s merit, and be taken out of context related to the payer’s capacity for non-sacrificial “contributions”.
Today, this “noble” ideal consumes almost one-sixth of a typical American’s earnings (more than a tithe), while reducing wages and salaries, pushing jobs overseas, and increasing unemployment. Further, the unchecked growth in this government expenditure dwarfs the costs of legitimate government functions, while driving the country towards figurative bankruptcy.
This exemplifies the price of altruism, which is not benevolence but instead the dutiful sacrifice to others as a principle of morality.
Historian H.W. Brands wished to write an extensive multi-volume history of the United States. However, publishers bulked that it would not sell, so Brands came up with a plan to do what he wanted while satisfying the publisher’s preference for biographies. His solution was a sequence of biographies that would cover the history of America.
Recently, I finished listening to the chronologically first in the series The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin. Overall, I judge Brands’ to be a good biography of Franklin; although, I preferred Carl Van Doren’s offering, despite its errors in attribution of works that Franklin published but did not write. To set context Brands’ book did include a wide range of people and events not explicitly Franklin. In doing so, I found that he gave a good overview of these critical externalities, but these were very high level brief summaries. However, such sign posts can be useful to identify interesting opportunities for learning more about a topic.
My own choice in readings to learn more American history is different and more voluminous. I am reading the definitive biographies of our presidents in order; currently reading Bemis’ volumes on John Quincy Adams. By definitive, I mean that I read all six volumes by Dumas Malone instead of a “popular” Jefferson biography by Joseph Ellis. I do supplement these with books on interesting subjects related to a president’s history—for example: biographies of related individuals such as Alexander Hamilton or Tecumseh; or books on a event such as the Panic of 1819.
Following my method, I have found the following general points:
reading conflicting view points from principles contesting an event provides a richer understanding and offers wisdom for one’s own personal conduct in life;
understanding past events in detail provides insights into current events and better policy options;
our knowledge of past events is not always complete and expert historians will honestly disagree about the interpretation of the same incomplete facts;
by presenting history in the context of an individual’s life, biographies communicate not only exalted events, but also the common in a context of a changing environment while providing perspective on what was ultimately important; and
having a broad and deep understanding of history allows one to identify dishonest, or simply erroneous, appeals to history in political disagreements.
If you care about learning more history, how to you approach it?
Let us get serious for a moment and discuss the Occupation that is destabilizing the Middle East. Since 1925, the House of Saud has been occupying the Hijaz, which is the region that includes the Islamic holy sites in Mecca and Medina.
The Saudis follow and propagate a deviate form of Islam (a reactionary form of Salafiyyah, and more specifically Wahhabism), which might be more generously labeled as heterodoxy. Consequently, Abul-Aziz ibn Saud’s violent conquest of the Hashemite ruler of the Hijaz has been controversial amongst Muslims. Thus, the conqueror (a religious crusader) and his sons, who subsequently ruled the kingdom, have attempted to legitimize their violent invasion and continued occupation of the Hijaz. Using the wealth created by western oil development, the Saudis have attempted to propagate their religious heterodoxy against modern Muslims, who seek improvement in the individual lives of themselves and their children in actual reality through western technology and values.
The Abul-Aziz’s militant lust for killing other Muslims included unsuccessful invasions of Jordan and Yemen; however, there may be others that escape my memory. The new generation of leaders of small states in the Arabian Gulf allied themselves with the United States in the war against Saddam’s Iraq seeking a great power protection against the Saudi’s lust for their domains and the designs of Persian mullahs willing to kill Muslim Arabs in order to gain greater geopolitical power through state control of oil reserves.
As a distraction from this Muslim upon Muslim murder and violence, the House of Saud has deceived Muslims with a faux conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. While Israel seeks peace and statehood for the Palestinians, the Saudis and other ignorant Muslim depots, whom the Saudis have duped, fund a Palestinian leadership that undermines peace and Palestinian statehood in their every effort. Given the forbearance demonstrated by the Israelis, the casualties in that persistent televised conflict are exceeded by the Muslim upon Muslim violence in Algeria. Absent the financing of Palestinian extremists by the Saudis and their dupes (such as the Bush and Obama Administrations), a modern life embracing individual rights and the pursuit of happiness would be available to the Palestinians in trade with Israel and the West.
So while the despotic Muslim rulers and demagogues of the Middle East suggest that terrorism and other Muslim violence can only be solved by negotiations between their violent (Muslim killing) Palestinian stooges and the Israelis, let me suggest another occupation that the United States could focus upon in its diplomacy…the Saudi occupation of the Hijaz.
As an antidote to President Obama’s State of the Union Address, consider the first one given by President George Washington…
Fellow Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:
I embrace with great satisfaction the opportunity which now presents itself of congratulating you on the present favorable prospects of our public affairs. The recent accession of the important state of north Carolina to the Constitution of the United States (of which official information has been received), the rising credit and respectability of our country, the general and increasing good will toward the government of the Union, and the concord, peace, and plenty with which we are blessed are circumstances auspicious in an eminent degree to our national prosperity.
In resuming your consultations for the general good you can not but derive encouragement from the reflection that the measures of the last session have been as satisfactory to your constituents as the novelty and difficulty of the work allowed you to hope. Still further to realize their expectations and to secure the blessings which a gracious Providence has placed within our reach will in the course of the present important session call for the cool and deliberate exertion of your patriotism, firmness, and wisdom.
Among the many interesting objects which will engage your attention that of providing for the common defense will merit particular regard. To be prepared for war is on e of the most effectual means of preserving peace.
A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite; and their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly military, supplies.
The proper establishment of the troops which may be deemed indispensable will be entitled to mature consideration. In the arrangements which may be made respecting it it will be of importance to conciliate the comfortable support of the officers and soldiers with a due regard to economy.
There was reason to hope that the pacific measures adopted with regard to certain hostile tribes of Indians would have relieved the inhabitants of our southern and western frontiers from their depredations, but you will perceive from the information contained in the papers which I shall direct to be laid before you (comprehending a communication from the Commonwealth of Virginia) that we ought to be prepared to afford protection to those parts of the Union, and, if necessary, to punish aggressors.
The interests of the United States require that our intercourse with other nations should be facilitated by such provisions as will enable me to fulfill my duty in that respect in the manner which circumstances may render most conducive to the public good, and to this end that the compensation to be made to the persons who may be employed should, according to the nature of their appointments, be defined by law, and a competent fund designated for defraying the expenses incident to the conduct of foreign affairs.
Various considerations also render it expedient that the terms on which foreigners may be admitted to the rights of citizens should be speedily ascertained by a uniform rule of naturalization.
Uniformity in the currency, weights, and measures of the United States is an object of great importance, and will, I am persuaded, be duly attended to.
The advancement of agriculture, commerce, and manufactures by all proper means will not, I trust, need recommendation; but I can not forbear intimating to you the expediency of giving effectual encouragement as well to the introduction of new and useful inventions from abroad as to the exertions of skill and genius in producing them at home, and of facilitating the intercourse between the distant parts of our country by a due attention to the post-office and post-roads.
Nor am I less persuaded that you will agree with me in opinion that there is nothing which can better deserve your patronage than the promotion of science and literature. Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of public happiness. In one in which the measures of government receive their impressions so immediately from the sense of the community as in ours it is proportionably essential.
To the security of a free constitution it contributes in various ways – by convincing those who are intrusted with the public administration that every valuable end of government is best answered by the enlightened confidence of the people, and by teaching the people themselves to know and to value their own rights; to discern and provide against invasions of them; to distinguish between oppression and the necessary exercise of lawful authority; between burthens proceeding from a disregard to their convenience and those resulting from the inevitable exigencies of society; to discriminate the spirit of liberty from that of licentiousness – cherishing the first, avoiding the last – and uniting a speedy but temperate vigilance against encroachments, with an inviolable respect to the laws.
Whether this desirable object will be best promoted by affording aids to seminaries of learning already established, by the institution of a national university, or by any other expedients will be well worthy of a place in the deliberations of the legislature.
Gentlemen of the House of Representatives:
I saw with peculiar pleasure at the close of the last session the resolution entered into by you expressive of your opinion that an adequate provision for the support of the public credit is a matter of high importance to the national honor and prosperity. In this sentiment I entirely concur; and to a perfect confidence in your best endeavors to devise such a provision as will be truly with the end I add an equal reliance on the cheerful cooperation of the other branch of the legislature.
It would be superfluous to specify inducements to a measure in which the character and interests of the United States are so obviously so deeply concerned, and which has received so explicit a sanction from your declaration.
Gentlemen of the Senate and House of Representatives:
I have directed the proper officers to lay before you, respectively, such papers and estimates as regard the affairs particularly recommended to your consideration, and necessary to convey to you that information of the state of the Union which it is my duty to afford.
The welfare of our country is the great object to which our cares and efforts ought to be directed, and I shall derive great satisfaction from a cooperation with you in the pleasing though arduous task of insuring to our fellow citizens the blessings which they have a right to expect from a free, efficient, and equal government.
With President Obama about to deliver another State of the Union address, I offer a three year old correction to the legislative priorities of our President and Congress. Unlike President Obama’s long long long boring and uninspired utterances, this superior address is only slightly longer than President Washington’s initial address.
Fellow Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:
In accordance with our Constitution, I come before you to report on the state of our Union, and recommend necessary legislation to protect the individual rights of our fellow citizens.
Today, the state of our Union is precarious. Truly, the republic has seen more acute peril, met firmly the challenge of that day, and progressively expanded the liberty of our citizens. However, we are again at a critical moment of choice.
In these times, our Constitution is being challenged. Governor Perry of Texas has openly discussed secession. More than 30 states pay lobbyists to represent them to Congress and the federal executive branch. State legislatures around the country consider bills designed to nullify existing and potential federal statutes within their borders. Former Speaker of the House Gingrich, a potential presidential candidate, has called for the impeachment of judges who protect individual citizens’ rights from prosecutions by subjective majority opinion.
The bitter and thoughtless partisanship within our polity is symptomatic of our malady. Instead of reasoned discourse, vitriol and hyperbolical rhetoric exaggerates small difference for the sake of political theater and advantage. Worse, our parties encourage extreme factions–who seek to violate the rights of their neighbor–to partisan action.
Another symptom is our recent economic downturn that was exacerbated by government regulation, which previous legislators had falsely promised would eliminate risk.
Further, the expansion of the public domain has strangled the independence of our civil society. Government aid became government influence, but now metastasizes into government control. As everything becomes politicized our fundamental liberties have been checked and subordinated in the name of the government’s interest.
However, our problems are more fundamental than these chilling symptoms. More than an unrestrained fiscal deficit, our republic suffers from a Justice deficit. Declining Achievement, falling Production, and constrained Freedom are the consequences of rising injustice. Ultimately, the metric by which we can assess improvement upon this Justice deficit is the degree to which the legislature, executive, and judiciary act to protect the individual rights of our citizens.
Instead of an expansive list of budget initiatives, I call your attention to four courses of action designed to address the fundamental issue of Justice and restore our constitutional balance by constraining unchecked executive power, averting a looming fiscal bankruptcy, ending national legislative encroachments upon state police powers, and restoring constitutional limits upon federal statutes.
First, I call upon the Congress to enact civil right legislation to extend substantive due process rights to our citizens who challenge executive administrative actions and rulings. Since 1984, the Supreme Court’s Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council decision has put an undue burden upon citizens seeking to defend themselves, their property, and their enterprises from federal executive powers that are beyond court review. That the executive can run unchecked by the judiciary is an injustice that Congress can and should redress, so that our citizens can defend their rights in court.
Second, to address our impending fiscal bankruptcy, I call upon the Congress to pass legislation to stop accruing eligibility for new federal Social Security and Medicare program benefits. This can be done in such a way as to protect the interests of those who have been paying into the system.
To prevent the expansion of existing liabilities, individual payroll taxes should be eliminated, thus freezing federal benefit liabilities at that point in time. Existing liabilities should be paid through tax reform, the sale of federal assets, and voluntary buyouts to be paid with bonds from the Social Security trust fund. By tax reform, I mean the combining of individual payroll and income tax withholdings at a lower flat rate without deductions, and the triggered phase out of employer payroll taxes.
Everyone will receive the benefits for which they have paid, but they will also be free from making future payments into the trust funds so that they can invest for their own retirement.
Third, I call upon the Congress to pass legislation to eliminate federal domestic policy mandates upon states and convert existing federal matching funds into a single no-strings-attached block grant program. These grants should be apportioned by legislative representation and reduced over time so as to decline to zero. By cutting the federal funding link to state policy, we can end the usurpation of state police powers committed by prior Congresses. Further, by maintaining and then drawing down funding, we will give the states the transition time required to adjust their own laws and funding sources.
Fourth, I call the Congress’ attention to prior Congresses who exceeded their enumerated powers, especially related to the interstate commerce clause. Although the President can protect our citizen from future unconstitutional legislation through the veto, past unconstitutional statutes must be corrected by the legislature and the courts.
On an on-going basis, to aid you in the protection of our citizens’ rights, I shall take the following actions:
(1) request the Congress either substantiate the constitutionality of prior statutes impinging upon our citizens’ rights or repeal such statutes,
(2) veto future appropriations that specifically support past statutes that remain unconstitutional in my judgment, and
(3) direct U.S. Attorneys to not challenge the standing of individuals seeking protection from previously noted unconstitutional statutes in court, and to limit the government’s response to constitutional challenges to those substantiations which Congress provided.
These transforming actions—directed towards civil rights, entitlement reform, federalism, and constitutionally focused government—have been selected because of their broad impact as first steps in governmental reform. There is much more that can and should be done. However, within this session of Congress, definitive and complete legislative action is necessary on all of these priority issues. Next year, there will be new challenges requiring our focus and cooperation.
In closing, let me repeat, and let us act upon, the words of President Washington in the first State of the Union message:
The welfare of our country is the great object to which our cares and efforts ought to be directed, and I shall derive great satisfaction from a cooperation with you in the pleasing though arduous task of insuring to our fellow citizens the blessings which they have a right to expect from a free, efficient, and equal government.
Selfish Citizenship 