Ruth Bader Ginsberg Just Rushed to Hospital

[idhawkman]

No, of course not. It was a figure of speech. I left work on very good terms with my employer and fellow employees. I worked in a very stressful environment, 100+ employees and all their problems, lots of odd shifts/days off. Had the working conditions been better, I would have worked another 2 years until I was eligible for Medicare (I'm 64), but I'd rather pay $1k/month for my own benefits rather than continue working under the conditions that were present when I retired.

I have a sister that can retire with full benefits from the state of Oregon but wants to wait until she's 65 for medicaid to kick in. She says that her entire SS check would have to go to paying health insurance if whe retires sooner. I hope Pelosi can get the house to focus on fixing this mess but I doubt they'll quit looking for haning trees long enough to get anything meaningful done.

[idhawkman]

Ginsberg has been fighting cancer and other health issues for 20 years. The doctors claim that they have removed all of the cancerous tumors. So long as she appears to have her wits about her, I have no problem with her continuing to serve. Even at 85, she's still 5 years short of the oldest serving SCOTUS justice. Having been beaten into submission from my former employment and retiring at age 63, my hat is off to her for possessing the kind of work ethic that has allowed her to continue in such a stressful environment.

I'm okay with her serving if she has her wits AND her medical requirements allow her enough time to use those wits. If the treatments infringe on her ability to hear arguments, do the research (mostly done by interns) and write opinions then it is time for her to go. In other words, I don't want a rubber stamp Pro or Con to any issue.

Ginsberg still hasn't missed a single argument in the 25 years she's been on SCOTUS. At this point, it's a non issue. We're getting ahead of ourselves.

No. I'm not getting ahead of myself. In fact, if the same situation pops up for any other SCOTUS I'd have the same position. I'm thinking you may have misunderstood my post. NOTE: There are two big "IF's" in my statement though.

[RiverDog]

No, of course not. It was a figure of speech. I left work on very good terms with my employer and fellow employees. I worked in a very stressful environment, 100+ employees and all their problems, lots of odd shifts/days off. Had the working conditions been better, I would have worked another 2 years until I was eligible for Medicare (I'm 64), but I'd rather pay $1k/month for my own benefits rather than continue working under the conditions that were present when I retired.

I have a sister that can retire with full benefits from the state of Oregon but wants to wait until she's 65 for medicaid to kick in. She says that her entire SS check would have to go to paying health insurance if whe retires sooner. I hope Pelosi can get the house to focus on fixing this mess but I doubt they'll quit looking for haning trees long enough to get anything meaningful done.

I think you meant Medicare, not Medicaid.

The reason I'm paying such a high health insurance premium is to maintain my elgibility for my former employer's retiree medical program. I must be enrolled in it continously from the day I retire to be eligible, and they charge an arm and a leg for pre-65 coverage. The premiums are twice as high had I opted to take COBRA for 18 months, but I would have missed out on benefits that would pay my wife and I $6k per year in health care credits of which we can use to help pay for a Medicare supplement. Even with the high premiums, we're still in good shape as I'm not even having to touch my SS account.

Early retirement is going to be a thing of the past. I fully expect the govt. to eliminate early SS withdrawls as it's bleeding the fund to death. I'd also expect them to raise the minimum age for Medicare to 67 so it corresponds to SS to further discourage early retirement.

There's no easy answers to the SS/Medicare mess. They can either cut benefits or raise taxes. Eliminating early retirements seems like the least painful of the options.

[idhawkman]

I think you meant Medicare, not Medicaid.

The reason I'm paying such a high health insurance premium is to maintain my elgibility for my former employer's retiree medical program. I must be enrolled in it continously from the day I retire to be eligible, and they charge an arm and a leg for pre-65 coverage. The premiums are twice as high had I opted to take COBRA for 18 months, but I would have missed out on benefits that would pay my wife and I $6k per year in health care credits of which we can use to help pay for a Medicare supplement. Even with the high premiums, we're still in good shape as I'm not even having to touch my SS account.

Early retirement is going to be a thing of the past. I fully expect the govt. to eliminate early SS withdrawls as it's bleeding the fund to death. I'd also expect them to raise the minimum age for Medicare to 67 so it corresponds to SS to further discourage early retirement.

There's no easy answers to the SS/Medicare mess. They can either cut benefits or raise taxes. Eliminating early retirements seems like the least painful of the options.

Yeah, she doesn't have to claim early SS but if she did the health care would consume the entire amount. If she doesn't claim SS then her retirement has to pay those premiums.
Raising the age is as you say the least painful but it will bolster the idea that it won't be around when we (I'm a little younger than you) or my kids get to retirement age which will be like 85 by then.

Raising taxes isn't feasible since our population is shrinking except for immigration. E.g. most families are having 1 or maybe 2 kids on average. I know there are the outlyers like PHillip RIvers with 8 but on average we are not sustaining our population numbers indigenously. Soon it will take 2 workers to pay for the beneifts on every retiree and that is not sustainable.

[RiverDog]

I think you meant Medicare, not Medicaid.

The reason I'm paying such a high health insurance premium is to maintain my elgibility for my former employer's retiree medical program. I must be enrolled in it continously from the day I retire to be eligible, and they charge an arm and a leg for pre-65 coverage. The premiums are twice as high had I opted to take COBRA for 18 months, but I would have missed out on benefits that would pay my wife and I $6k per year in health care credits of which we can use to help pay for a Medicare supplement. Even with the high premiums, we're still in good shape as I'm not even having to touch my SS account.

Early retirement is going to be a thing of the past. I fully expect the govt. to eliminate early SS withdrawls as it's bleeding the fund to death. I'd also expect them to raise the minimum age for Medicare to 67 so it corresponds to SS to further discourage early retirement.

There's no easy answers to the SS/Medicare mess. They can either cut benefits or raise taxes. Eliminating early retirements seems like the least painful of the options.

Yeah, she doesn't have to claim early SS but if she did the health care would consume the entire amount. If she doesn't claim SS then her retirement has to pay those premiums.
Raising the age is as you say the least painful but it will bolster the idea that it won't be around when we (I'm a little younger than you) or my kids get to retirement age which will be like 85 by then.

Raising taxes isn't feasible since our population is shrinking except for immigration. E.g. most families are having 1 or maybe 2 kids on average. I know there are the outlyers like PHillip RIvers with 8 but on average we are not sustaining our population numbers indigenously. Soon it will take 2 workers to pay for the beneifts on every retiree and that is not sustainable.

Social Security is going to become a smaller percentage of retirement income until it finally ceases to exist. If you're under 55, better not count on it being there, certainly not at the level it is today. Pensions are going the same route, too. Companies are phasing them out, as well they should. 401K's are much better and more reliable retirement income vehicles than pensions as you have so much more control over them, and they're portable, so you can take them from one employer to another. And if your new employer doesn't have a 401K program, you can roll it over into a self directed IRA. The Central States Pension Fund, a.k.a. Teamsters, is a classic example of a failed pension system.

I hate to say it, but at some point, we're going to be forced to go to a single payer system for all medical insurance. You can't raise premiums because the younger, healthier folks will simply choose not to participate, which is what insurance companies rely on to pay the bills. The only answer is going to be to tax everyone and make those already on the system (like I will be in 10 months) to pay higher premiums.

It's wise of your sister to defer taking her SS money. Wait until you're 70 and you get 132% of your full retirement amount. One of my pet peeves about our younger generation is that they're not dedicating enough money to their retirement. I've had very smart young adults that I've mentored that weren't even contributing enough to their 401K's to get the maximum company match even though they didn't have any kids. The main reason I was able to retire early was because my wife and I made hefty contributions to our 401K's and paid off all our bills.

I'm going off on a tangent here. I might have to start a retirement/insurance thread.

[Aseahawkfan]

They need to raise the work age on SS and medicare. This whole retire and relax for 20 years while others pay you is trash. It's trash when it's called welfare. It's trash as SS. SS should be for people that are mostly infirmed and can't work. And more kids means more people to take care of, more crowded streets, more mouths to feed, and the like. Building tax systems based on population expansion is a recipe for disaster. I don't want to end up like China. Crack the whip on the human herd and get them working. They can't keep looking at the government for their well being like sheep looking to to the shepherd unless they're willing to keep putting out the wool, milk, and meat to pay for it all.

There's this idea humans are some kind of special creature. They aren't. They will be as lazy as a crocodile sitting in the shallows of the river letting the sun warm him if they can be meaning they'll golf all day or play video games if you don't get them working. Social security needs to be built with the idea of sustaining only the infirmed, not some kind of national vacation policy, which is what it is now. I plan to work until I can't, hopefully until I drop dead. I can't even imagine sitting at home doing nothing but piddling around.

[RiverDog]

They need to raise the work age on SS. This whole retire and relax for 20 years while others pay you is trash. It's trash when it's called welfare. It's trash as SS. SS should be for people that are mostly infirmed and can't work. And more kids means more people to take care of, more crowded streets, more mouths to feed, and the like. Building tax systems based on population expansion is a recipe for disaster. I don't want to end up like China. Crack the whip on the human herd and get them working. They can't keep looking at the government for their well being like sheep looking to to the shepherd unless they're willing to keep putting out the wool, milk, and meat to pay for it all.

Check out Idahawk's thread on retirement and insurance.

[savvyman]

They need to raise the work age on SS and medicare. This whole retire and relax for 20 years while others pay you is trash. It's trash when it's called welfare. It's trash as SS. SS should be for people that are mostly infirmed and can't work. And more kids means more people to take care of, more crowded streets, more mouths to feed, and the like. Building tax systems based on population expansion is a recipe for disaster. I don't want to end up like China. Crack the whip on the human herd and get them working. They can't keep looking at the government for their well being like sheep looking to to the shepherd unless they're willing to keep putting out the wool, milk, and meat to pay for it all.

There's this idea humans are some kind of special creature. They aren't. They will be as lazy as a crocodile sitting in the shallows of the river letting the sun warm him if they can be meaning they'll golf all day or play video games if you don't get them working. Social security needs to be built with the idea of sustaining only the infirmed, not some kind of national vacation policy, which is what it is now. I plan to work until I can't, hopefully until I drop dead. I can't even imagine sitting at home doing nothing but piddling around.

Yes - Exactly what the ruling class has successfully programed your mind to accept.

Great idea - work people into the grave while all benefits flow to the .01%'s

Idiot - we all paid big money into this system during our working years.

[burrrton]

Great idea - work people into the grave while all benefits flow to the .01%'s

Hey, savvy- guess which group of people are the only ones *not* to get back more than they put in to the system?

[savvyman]

Hey, savvy- guess which group of people are the only ones *not* to get back more than they put in to the system?

1. Millions of people here and working illegally who pay social security taxes but are ineligible to collect benefits?

2. Every Millennial?

3. ?

[Aseahawkfan]

Yes - Exactly what the ruling class has successfully programed your mind to accept.

Great idea - work people into the grave while all benefits flow to the .01%'s

Idiot - we all paid big money into this system during our working years.

What ruling class do you speak of? No one rules me but me. If you feel ruled by someone, you must be some weak-minded person that needs papa government to tell you what you should do.

You paid into a system built upon a bad idea that became some kind of retirement fund for your vacation. Do that on your own dime. The government was supposed to create a program to cover you when you were infirmed, not because you want to spend 20 years golfing.

Eliminating the cost part as Idhawkman pointed out my numbers were way off. i was thinking of medicare not social security tax.

If you can work, work. Warren Buffett is part of your so callled "ruling class", he's 88, guess what? He still works. Get back to work. The "ruling class" works their entire life, why shouldn't you? You tinfoil hat wearers talking about a ruling class don't even know much about the work habits that propel a person to high levels of success. You just want to find ways to pay 2.2% of your income for some retirement fund while the "ruling class" keeps building businesses to keep your retirement dreamy you couldn't manage yourself going.

[idhawkman]

Great idea - work people into the grave while all benefits flow to the .01%'s

Hey, savvy- guess which group of people are the only ones *not* to get back more than they put in to the system?

Here's a take on what Savvyman said that you may not have considered Burrton. If you have, no worries - not trying to pick a fight on this one.

If you raise the retirment age, the .01%ers use you until you are just about dead. That's what raising the retirement age is - making the gap between retirment and death a shorter span. So while they've used you and your labors for 5 or 6 decades and they've benefited massively off your results, you get maybe 5 to 10 years in a program that won't repay your input back let alone interest for almost all of that time. Wouldn't you pay the pitence the govt. requires in order to milk the labor of the working class knowing that it is all a ruse that the working class zombies won't catch on to?

[idhawkman]

What ruling class do you speak of? No one rules me but me. If you feel ruled by someone, you must be some weak-minded person that needs papa government what you should do.

You paid into a system built upon a bad idea that became some kind of retirement fund for your vacation. Do that on your own dime. The government was supposed to create a program to cover you when you were infirmed, not because you want to spend 20 years golfing.

You did not pay big money. Some of you paid less than 2% of your income. The current rate is 2.2%. You pay 2 cents of every dollar earned over your lifetime up to a fund you hoped would cover your 20 year retirement. Guess what? That doesn't work very well. Try doing that with your money without anyone else paying, see how well it works. You have to save way more than 2.2% to make that work for 20 plus years. Wonder how the government pulled off what the average investor can't? Maybe they planned poorly?

If you can work, work. Warren Buffett is part of your so callled "ruling class", he's 88, guess what? He still works. Get back to work. The "ruling class" works their entire life, why shouldn't you? You tinfoil hat wearers talking about a ruling class don't even know much about the work habits that propel a person to high levels of success. You just want to find ways to pay 2.2% of your income for some retirement fund while the "ruling class" keeps building businesses to keep your retirement dreamy you couldn't manage yourself going.

Wow are you way off on your numbers Asea. The OASDI rate was at 2.2% back in 1957 for employees and 1951 for the self employed. Now the rate for OASDI plus HI for employees is: 7.65% and for self employed it is 15.3%

Here's the link listing the rates over history. https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ProgData/taxRates.html

[idhawkman]

Just curious Asea, how much money would you be able to earn on your own money over 5 or 6 decades based on the rates and their increase history? I bet you dollars to donuts you would be able to retire comfortably with your investments that would continue earning money for you way before 65 years of age and live only on the interest or earnings of the capital.

[burrrton]

If you raise the retirment age, the .01%ers use you until you are just about dead.

I'm not saying it's bad- I'm just pointing out to Mr. ONE PERCENTERS the only ones who don't make out like bandits on it are the ones who max out the contribution- AKA "TEH ONE PERCENTARS".

I get tired of identity politics and the politics of envy.

[idhawkman]

I'm not saying it's bad- I'm just pointing out to Mr. ONE PERCENTERS the only ones who don't make out like bandits on it are the ones who max out the contribution- AKA "TEH ONE PERCENTARS".

I get tired of identity politics and the politics of envy.

I'm with you there, so tired of the identity politics and personal destruction attacks on people who want to serve the public.

[Aseahawkfan]

I am way off. I forgot about the employer contributions. The self-employed pay both. I haven't read up on social security for years as it was something I wasn't planning to need as much. I plan to work until near dead and I have a good amount of invested capital. That number is only going to worsen until they fully implement socialized medicine forcing down prices. They won't have a choice given the current direction society is headed.

[Aseahawkfan]

Just curious Asea, how much money would you be able to earn on your own money over 5 or 6 decades based on the rates and their increase history? I bet you dollars to donuts you would be able to retire comfortably with your investments that would continue earning money for you way before 65 years of age and live only on the interest or earnings of the capital.

Over the course of your life, an immense amount. That is if I had learned to invest when young, which the education system did not teach when I was in school. I doubt we could trust people to invest their money intelligently. We would have so many people investing poorly that our poor class would increase. Certain people could opt out of social security, but others maybe not. I've taken a bath in the market before. The tech crash back in 2001 crushed me. I almost avoided it. I was out of the market the first month. The market kept on rising and I felt I was missing out on returns. Once I was crushed, I became obsessed with earning it back. I invested in DSL stocks. You probably know what happened next. Even using quality research, market information changed so quickly that the market crushed my finances. We're talking losses in the 90 plus percent. It was nasty. I did learn my lesson. I am a lot more careful now. The returns are slower, but the money is safe.

As much as I push investing, social security is something the nation needs for no other reason than the number of folks not capable of investing in a careful and consistent manner. I don't know how many could recover from the losses I took.

The biggest problem in the world is the scale of it. We have 350 million folks trying to survive. Different education levels, intelligence, interests, and capabilities. Social security is a nice even sum to provide a floor for survival of the old. I in no way want to advocate for being cruel to the old. My current problem is that social security was primarily built to help people survive the years they can't work and I mean can't. It was not meant as a retirement fund for people to spend 15 or 20 years traveling and doing whatever. If they want to do that, then they should spend more of their money doing that, not expect it to derive from taxes.

The rise in tax rates to pay for all the medicare and social security come from the conflict of expensive, advanced medical technology, longer lifespans, and a large population working within n archaic system meant to support old folks that usually passed away within 5 to 10 years of retirement using walkers and lower cost medical tech. This doesn't mix well and will require substantial change. How do we fix it without being cruel? Not sure, but I know it will be costly. Much higher costs than we have now. And this attempt to put everyone on medicare/medicaid regardless of if they are working or not seems like a recipe for disaster.

I think if they want this system to maintain, they will have to take the slightly less cruel stance of ensuring people work longer basing Social Security age on life expectancy. If you want to retire early, fund it on your own. If not, you work until you're fairly near death. It hasn't helped that the cultural paradigm has changed from families caring for their old to the old being alone. For all the negative talk of immigrants, it's pretty rare I see them treating their parents like American born and raised families treat each other. We need some of that back. It would ease the burden on the system if families picked up some of the cost of caring for the old in their family.

What percentage of folks do you think could intelligently manage their finances over the course of a life? Do we have teach the skills to do so in school right now? Does our culture encourage savings? I'm of the mind to answer to those questions is no. Until we change some of them, social security is necessary not to have a highly impoverished group of seniors. I don't know that that is something anyone wants.

The common American experience in education and culture does not teach you to invest. I learned nearly all I know about investing on my own. The information is out there, but it is definitely not taught in the standard paths of education. The usual path for someone that is at least putting effort into planning retirement is the one Riverdog took using his company's retirement options. Options of a similar quality to what he had is rare nowadays. Most companies seem to be offering plans that base retirement on the market in the form of mutual funds or the like. A quality retirement program seems to be a thing of the past. Hopefully we will see a new paradigm shift for retirement planning that leads to an improved system as the old methods are not there any longer, especially given that staying with the same company until retirement seems to be a thing of the past.

[idhawkman]

Over the course of your life, an immense amount. That is if I had learned to invest when young, which the education system did not teach when I was in school. I doubt we could trust people to invest their money intelligently. We would have so many people investing poorly that our poor class would increase. Certain people could opt out of social security, but others maybe not. I've taken a bath in the market before. The tech crash back in 2001 crushed me. I almost avoided it. I was out of the market the first month. The market kept on rising and I felt I was missing out on returns. Once I was crushed, I became obsessed with earning it back. I invested in DSL stocks. You probably know what happened next. Even using quality research, market information changed so quickly that the market crushed my finances. We're talking losses in the 90 plus percent. It was nasty. I did learn my lesson. I am a lot more careful now. The returns are slower, but the money is safe.

As much as I push investing, social security is something the nation needs for no other reason than the number of folks not capable of investing in a careful and consistent manner. I don't know how many could recover from the losses I took.

The biggest problem in the world is the scale of it. We have 350 million folks trying to survive. Different education levels, intelligence, interests, and capabilities. Social security is a nice even sum to provide a floor for survival of the old. I in no way want to advocate for being cruel to the old. My current problem is that social security was primarily built to help people survive the years they can't work and I mean can't. It was not meant as a retirement fund for people to spend 15 or 20 years traveling and doing whatever. If they want to do that, then they should spend more of their money doing that, not expect it to derive from taxes.

The rise in tax rates to pay for all the medicare and social security come from the conflict of expensive, advanced medical technology, longer lifespans, and a large population working within n archaic system meant to support old folks that usually passed away within 5 to 10 years of retirement using walkers and lower cost medical tech. This doesn't mix well and will require substantial change. How do we fix it without being cruel? Not sure, but I know it will be costly. Much higher costs than we have now. And this attempt to put everyone on medicare/medicaid regardless of if they are working or not seems like a recipe for disaster.

I think if they want this system to maintain, they will have to take the slightly less cruel stance of ensuring people work longer basing Social Security age on life expectancy. If you want to retire early, fund it on your own. If not, you work until you're fairly near death. It hasn't helped that the cultural paradigm has changed from families caring for their old to the old being alone. For all the negative talk of immigrants, it's pretty rare I see them treating their parents like American born and raised families treat each other. We need some of that back. It would ease the burden on the system if families picked up some of the cost of caring for the old in their family.

What percentage of folks do you think could intelligently manage their finances over the course of a life? Do we have teach the skills to do so in school right now? Does our culture encourage savings? I'm of the mind to answer to those questions is no. Until we change some of them, social security is necessary not to have a highly impoverished group of seniors. I don't know that that is something anyone wants.

The common American experience in education and culture does not teach you to invest. I learned nearly all I know about investing on my own. The information is out there, but it is definitely not taught in the standard paths of education. The usual path for someone that is at least putting effort into planning retirement is the one Riverdog took using his company's retirement options. Options of a similar quality to what he had is rare nowadays. Most companies seem to be offering plans that base retirement on the market in the form of mutual funds or the like. A quality retirement program seems to be a thing of the past. Hopefully we will see a new paradigm shift for retirement planning that leads to an improved system as the old methods are not there any longer, especially given that staying with the same company until retirement seems to be a thing of the past.

Pretty good post overall and a lot I would agree with. Here's some things that came to mind when reading it.

1. You're correct, not everyone would be "WISE" in their investments. The problem I have with the solutions to this are:
a. Why do we have to be punished for other's actions?
b. If SS is taking their percentage, main IRS is taking theirs, Local and State is taking theirs, property taxes, sales taxes, gas taxes, fees (like DMV, business, etc), how much do we expect people to live on and how much should we expect them to save for their "OWN" retirement?

2. If we actually taught in schools what you know or what others have learned, then everyone would be following the leader with the same analysis and investment strategies. Worst of all, the mellinials would figure out how to program a computer to automate it all and bankrupt the ones who don't know how to automate it.

3. At some magical age more people will die than taking the benefits. I feel bad for those that die before ever getting to benefit from the system. Their entire contribution is confiscated and redistributed without any of their input.

[idhawkman]

Getting back on topic here, RBG has missed oral arguments for the first time. I'm not too nervous about this yet, but if it continues it will become a big problem with me. Oral arguments are essential in my mind for determining equal justice. Written notes can't convey body posture, emotion, expressions, etc.