History:  Social Security was instituted in the years of Franklin Roosevelt with the objective of making sure that many of our citizens were able to have a retirement annuity.  The money was kept and invested by the Social Security Administration for the benefit of the citizens who were paying the premiums for this insurance annuity.  During the years of Lyndon Johnson the fund was moved into the US Government General Fund.  The results of the large amounts of cash flowing into the General Fund clouded the fact that the Federal Government was running huge deficits and allowed the Federal Government to borrow the money from the Social Security Fund at artificially low interest rates.  The result of this act helped to keep the fund from building the assets needed to pay future benefits.  

A prime example is Galveston, Texas and its decision to opt out of the Social Security System at that time. They retained control of their money and invested it in stocks and bonds and earned a return on their money three or four times greater than the Social Security Fund.  A participant in their fund would draw about $4000 per month instead of $1000 per month under Social Security for the same amount paid into each fund.

The promise to people in the Social Security system was that they would receive annuity payments based on the amount that they invested in the system.  This promise was made to many people 45 or more years ago. The government now wants to "means test" Social Security payments.  That means they want to steal all of the money put into the system by those people that worked hard, saved and have other sources of income for their retirement.

What is Social Security?  Social Security was started as a simple (but forced) insurance annuity so that when you retired you would have a guaranteed source of income.  It has slowly evolved into another Welfare Program and "means testing" payments will turn it into a total Welfare Program.  The question is quite simple.  Do we want Social Security to be a Welfare Program or a Retirement Program?

Retirement Program:  The answer to shortfalls in the system is very easy if we choose a retirement annuity. Under this choice we do not have any payroll taxes we only have insurance premiums.  Because there have been significant increases in the life span of the average individual, a simple actuarial study will solve the problem.  As part of this approach the Social Security Administration must also be removed from the General Fund and the money flowing into the system must be invested by the system.  All of the Welfare Programs tacked onto Social Security must stay with the General Fund.

Welfare Program:  Should we choose to make Social Security a Welfare Program, then it is up to the politicians to fight over how to fund the program and at what levels to fund the program.  In all fairness the Federal Government should refund all of the money paid into the system by every citizen that was promised a retirement annuity and not a Welfare Program when they started to invest in Social Security.

All of this information was readily available and is put into a logical format rather than being slanted to one side or the other.

You decide what you want a Social Security Annuity or another Welfare Program.