You Will Never Retire
currentaffairs.org
currentaffairs.org
We discovered nuclear fission in the 40s. We can fix atmospheric nitrogen into industrial fertilizer. We communicate at the speed of light. We can manufacture things so absurdly complicated and with such small tolerances that we can do everything from microelectronics to spaceflight. We can and do literally farm in deserts and we do alchemy as a power source!
So how is it that our primary means of collaboration dates to antiquity and potentially into prehistory? Here I specifically mean the mechanism of prices and currency exchange.
We refined it somewhat at various points - we layered powerful abstractions onto it with the invention of the corporation and securitized ownership thereof; we gave it a macro structure with capitalism and free markets, to socialize the concepts we wanted people to engage with. But at the end of the day, the system works because it is the most accepting of reality - it is a system that reinforces itself when people are driven to try to exploit it, instead of falling apart. Indeed, it reinforces almost too well - most of our intervention into it takes the form of "nudging" local minima - breaking up monopolies, enforcing minimum qualities, etc.
So, we have this system that has been fundamentally the same. And to my perception, we have two ways out: we either Star Trek our way to complete abundance, to where the cost of everything is ~0 so everyone might as well be given enough. Or - we decide that even though it is not free, it is time that everyone has enough. And given we've managed to literally perform alchemy and actual biblical miracles of agriculture, and we're still not really much closer, I hesitate to say that anything but the conversion of energy to highly-structured matter - a la Star Trek replicators - will make notable progress here.
So I think that the next big step forward will be philosophical. We need to take this urge that the article mentions - where people see the 90 year old working in the street, say "this is wrong", and correct it - and we need to make it so that people believe and live it axiomatically. We need to say - even though I cannot see them, and they may not look like me or think like me, they should have enough.
Whether or not we need it, we can't have it indefinitely. So the best thing to do long-term is to rethink our economic system so it will work without it.
Anyone who disputes this is lying to themselves about the true and ruthless nature of humanity, and disrespects the mechanisms that have allowed themselves to exist and ask that very question.
This is your permission to do whatever you can get away with in the quest to amass as much of whatever is the current measurement of conquest. Be it money, fame, or power. It will never be enough, but that's not your place to ask why. Only how you will conquest.
Which is to say that one of the unique things about humans is our ability to get along with each other. To form ever-larger stable communities. So I question your declaration that the "true nature of humanity" is to be in competition with one another. I'd say we're the dominant species on the planet precisely because we have an ability to put aside competition and cooperate with each other. Not always, of course, but the majority of the time.
It is, when you actually think about it, quite selfless to tell people to be selfish and to take care of and control their own affairs, as the least likely person to receive any benefit by following the speaker's advice is the actual speaker.
On the other hand, it is exceptionally selfish to tell others to place others' well-being ahead of their own for the opposite reason, that following the speaker's advice is absolutely more likely to benefit the speaker (and everyone else) at the expense of the listener.
Accordingly, it's utterly incoherent for anyone acting upon this self-centered philosophy to tell anyone else to do it, because the first principle of being a wolf among sheep is don't let other wolves into the fold.
Unlike most paradoxes, this "Randian paradox" has an easy resolution: it's utter bullshit parroted by asshole psychopaths who have been wishing desperately their whole lives for justification that their utter disregard for the wellbeing of their fellow humans is actually a good thing. It's not.
> the first principle of being a wolf among sheep
and one way to spot an asshole psychopath is that they divide the world into "wolves" and "sheep" and, of course, put themselves in the "wolves" category.
The only thing that conquest brings is death, suffering, and broken men.
Prosperity increases in areas and populations that are peaceful and decreases in populations and areas that are not peaceful.
I understand the people who fail to see this, and I pity them.
A diet too rich in documentaries on WWII and the Roman Empire leads to intellectual malnutrition.
If you are questioning whether or not prosperity is increasing, especially in peaceful areas, I cannot help you. Not being able to tell that we are currently in the most prosperous and peaceful era of human history, and it isn't even close, is like not being able to tell if it is raining or not whilst standing in the middle of a downpour. I would first have to explain what water is, the water cycle, what the sensation of wetness is, other sensory perceptions of rainfall, and a basic understanding of what objective facts are and I don't have time for that.
And of course we have entire disciplines of study that are basically devoted to finding a justification for being a greedy asshole. I'm guessing you're a fan of those lines of study?
The fact is that the world is complicated, and we're here now and it's our turn to say what it means to be human.
There is only one way out now - wealth tax to fund social security.
This would more than double the current $4.2 trillion in funds and extend the runway to bankruptcy ~10 years. That's not nothing, but it's a move you can only place once as no one with any chance of being impacted would stay around.
I also think Social Security's implementation is regressive, and this only makes that worse. Social Security is a payroll tax, so it only gets paid on payroll. I suspect that millionaires and billionaires pay very little in Social Security and would continue to pay very little because their income is almost all investments, which doesn't require Social Security tax.
Highly compensated employees are often paid largely in stock, which I believe also doesn't get hit by Social Security (but I could be wrong there).
We are talking a significant swing in tax burden for people in the upper-middle/lower-upper. At $200k, it's about close to a 3 point increase in overall tax burden (i.e. from 20% of income to 23% or what have you). At $400k, it's close to a 5 point increase (~16% increase in overall tax rate). It also double-dips because employers pay half of that; at a $200k salary, it's about an extra $4,500 in taxes from the employee and $4,500 from the employer ($16.5k from both at $400k). In reality, the employee will likely pay for both with withheld raises/bonuses that the company uses to pay for the new tax.
Perhaps, but the fund was healthy when we had a balanced budget at the turn of the century. That’s why the Bush administration was able to deliver those tax cuts for their wealthy donors since they could deploy some confabulations about increased economic growth balancing out a “minor” change and were able to drown out the people who actually do math.
Have you seen graphs like https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/1.png ?
The obvious answer (at least to me) is "the ratio of beneficiaries to contributors is substantially worse than it was in 2000, and it will only get worse in the coming years". In 2000, there were about 23 people withdrawing from SS per 100 people contributing so each worker funded about a quarter of a SS account. In 2022, that had increased nearly 50% to ~32 people withdrawing per 100 contributing, so each worker is funding about a third of a SS. By 2060, we're projected to be at 50:100, so each worker has to fund half of a SS account.
The ratio of retirees to workers has never been worse, and is only going to continue to worsen. It's either going to go bankrupt or grow to be an enormous tax.
Just extrapolating from the current numbers, the average SS monthly payout is current $1,782.74.
We're currently at 32 withdrawers per 100 payers, so 100 payers have to cover $57,047.68/month or $570.48/payer/month.
On a 2060 population curve (no inflation because SSI is indexed to wages, so both sides inflate roughly evenly), there's 51 withdrawers per 100 payers, so at the same monthly payment those 100 payers have to cover $108,747.14/month or $1,087.47/payer/month.
Even removing the income cap entirely doesn't fix that. As of 2017 (the last year I could easily Google data), 84% of earnings were taxed under SS. Removing the cap entirely would only increase SS revenue by ~20%, which only makes it solvent slightly longer. There is no way around the fact that if SS is going to stay solvent, we're going to have to either increase the tax rate substantially (or change how it's applied), decrease the payouts substantially, or change our age curve substantially with birth rates or immigration.
That's why I think they should have reformed it in like the 70s, when the age demographics were much more favorable. Changing age ratios have always been a threat to either make Social Security insolvent or make the Social Security tax balloon to an incredible size.
This would be stupid. You collect money from the passive gains that are rising automatically.
If the $1 billion grows automagically to $1.1 billion - that is $100 million earned without doing anything - just tax that $100 million at say 10% which will make their return $90 million instead of the $100 million. They will still end up with $1.09 billion but they also return some value to the rest of the society that is making them wealthy.
Do this over and over for every concentrated billion in existence and keep funding social security deficits.
This problem will be resolved, by our action or inaction as a society. We just need to decide the corpse/profit ratio we want.
For someone born in the Soviet Union, this idea sticks so bad there's not a slightest inclination to try it out.
Other approach is "the government should directly own the productive assets it creates itself, not buys on the market", but that will create an even bigger conflict of interest (government will have to make sure those pesky private businesses don't compete with it), it will be truly a resurrection of the Soviet Union, and a wall will soon be needed to keep people in, rather than to keep them out. Been there, done that. No need to repeat the same to arrive to the same result again.
Why not just educate people into investing better instead? It has a side consequence of (purely by chance) making some people multimillionaire heirs simply because their granny lived a very long life and markets were good, thus creating a lot of surplus money to spend or invest. Old people tend to be stingy so that money is unlikely to be spent before their death.
So 401ks were intended to do this in a way. I think it was the greatest theft of a generation.
"Lets incentivize and normalize the middle class to give the rich their retirement funds to play with."
In general stock investment does nothing but make the distribution of wealth more and more lopsided. For every dollar gained by the poorer the rich gain more. When the rich gain more, they get to leverage the new capital to get even more next time in a positive feedback loop.
Sure many of the people I talked with complained about the government stepping on its own toes to try to increase tourism or provide grants for building new things, etc., but I also saw women walking alone in the middle of capital cities at midnight because it was perfectly safe to do so.
Granted this is just one small country in Europe but if that's what socialism, generational stagnation, and people checking checkboxes looks like then sign me up. That said ...
> Why not just educate people into investing better instead?
Yes! This along with critical thinking about social media, lessons on how to fill out your taxes, fostering an interest in local politics over national politics, and maybe America can get its head out of its ass and actually produce happiness instead of just money.
For example they are making 30-50% the pay of a software engineer in California or New York, and that’s in a “rich” european country like Germany or France. The chance of owning a house is almost impossible. They don’t have access to open spaces even remotely like Colorado. Obviously what you prefer will be up to you, but the US has a lot more options in terms of the lifestyle you can choose from.
I agree that working as en employee you will never get ahead. Which is why you should start your own company or invest if this is something you desire.
Also Europe might fall behind ik economic growth, there is a lot of innovation coming from Europe, exactly because of stricter governmental regulation regarding green enerfy, recycling, consumer rights ef cetera
I lived part time in New York and have plenty of colleagues on both coasts and saw how that pay was eaten up by massive rent and house payments and food costs.
Not saying Europe is perfect but living in Colorado, where I was born, is like watching a best friend become a whore. Such beauty and light consumed by the hunger of the people using it.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/chinas-in...
https://blogs.cornell.edu/info2040/2021/09/28/involution-nei...
There is very little value in taking care of old people. Unless the government mandates that some proportion of the economy is dedicated to taking care of the elderly and expecting nothing in return, we are forced to rely on ponzi schemes.
And yes, this may be "socialism" but who cares? The government already owns all the land and all the dollars in circulation, they just lend them to you. The illusion of freedom is shattered for you by the word "socialism" but make no mistake this country is not some libertarian paradise.
1. This provides a benefit in exchange for the trade-in, basically end-running the inevitable Fourth Amendment kvetching if we just eminent-domained a stock holding, and the massive up-front cost of buying shares at market.
2. It automatically diversifies the holdings-- there is no "list of what companies the state can buy", it's basically every enterprise larger than a lemonade stand.
I also love the idea of giving the state voting stock in private enterprise. It will be used politically to maximize accountability. Maybe American regulators have no say about the labour or environmental conditions in a factory you run in Burkina Faso, but give those regulators 30% of the voting shares of the company and let them try to yeet the Board of Directors, I bet that gets action!
I also figured a lot of the trick to solving problems like retirement and homelessness was just to move more services outside of the dollar-denominated economy. Replacing "this apartment costs $1750 per month, and next year it will be $1900" with "we are obliged by law to accept your Class J-45 Housing Ration Voucher" means there's no way to claw additional assets from the poorest people who need the produc
Any government solution also means paternalism. Which is, government deliberately makes life better for worse people, and worse for better people. It can make anyone into a Republican!