What are you willing to give up?

I agree with mnn2501 and tinknal.
Cover your heads, the sky is falling somewhere!

I would like to add that I want to give up supporting illegal immigrants and their anchor babies.

We already have a "stupid tax"... its called the lottery.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

OK, how about the "vicarious life" tax?

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Flaming Xtian
I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
Mahatma Gandhi


Libertarindependent

We didn't participate in our local home school co-op / groups. We checked into it the first semester of the first year we home educated.........
Yeah, not for us!

In our state, the laws for home schooling are pretty simple.
Educate for 180 days.
That's it.

I really loved that flexibility!!

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I am sure of two things: There is a God, and I am not Him.
The movie Rudy

I thought it might be nice if I chimed in here since the thread started with a question I posted.
I will not say what I would give up. I will post what I have given up.
I support three adult children and three grandchildren so that they do not go on the list of welfare, food stamps, medicare etc. This is not "Your" family. I don't expect to ask any of you to support them until I cannot.
I have not used credit to buy anything for over 15 years. I believe credit drives up the price of everything. You can thank me that you do not pay more for bread and you are welcome
I have not owned a new car, in fact I have not owned a car that cost more than $2500 in that same 15 year period. probably longer. All that money I saved on finance charged and depreciation goes toward supporting my family.

We do not run off to the doctor or ER every time we have a sniffle. I believe that doing so drives up the cost of health care in this country. I also believe health insurance as it is used today does also but my job provides that so I do use it when needed. That insurance company is making a fortune off me.

I manage two warehouses for our department. We get our new budget on july 1st of every year. It is well known by everyone that we want all the money we have spent in no more than 6 weeks. we then live the rest of the year paying for anything that comes up in the red. this then makes next years budget allotment higher. That is how it works. Spend everything you have asap so you can claim to be broke and get more next time.

Basically I live in every way buying what I need today with what I have today. sure it would be nice to drive a brand new car. but who has $30,000 laying around. Last month I bought a nice $1600 car. I find myself with a couple thousand dollars regularly enough to keep my family in transportation.

I believe with very very few exceptions the government should concern itself with civil order, protection from a very limited number of threats with defense of our country being one. forming passing and enforcement of laws. maintaining public property such as parks, roads etc. And very little if anything else. The care of the needy needs to at worst be on a local and personal level and at best done by the people not by the government of the people. I am not saying that all social programs should be abolished. they need to be done different and much much better.
I work for the government and I believe that if the general public had any idea how much money is wasted. they woudl drop in their tracks of a heart attack. IF the same money was turned over to those that would get the job done right, efficiently and with real results. No one woudl be homeless, no one woudl be hungry, no one would lack medical care. Look at Obama's bail out spending. If that same money had been used to pay off struggling mortgages. How many people woudl never have lost their homes? I know it is not that simple. But for just a moment think about how many houses that money could have built. That was a lot of many, does anyone know anyone that benefited from any of it? Could the government really just waste that much money. I am telling you they can, in a heart beat.

24 people at my university in my department alone got laid off this year. then someone found $750,000 in lost money. First how do you loose 3/4 of a million dollars??? Does a person that can loose that much money still have a pulse? Second do you think they did the obvious thing and bring all those laid off workers back? Nope. They just spent the money as fast as they could on anything they could think of. Mainly on equipment that helps them get the work done with less labor. Since that is the problem they face today. Nobody not one person thought beyond their own person effort level. It is easier to jsut order a bunch of machines than jump through the hoops it would require to bring our employees back.
I see the issue of government inefficiency as so complete that there actually is no hope. and the people will not be able to shoulder that burden forever. You all will collapse under it.
The answer is the government stops being allowed to do much of anything. You think you woudl not pay $24,000 to have a floor scrubbed? Guess again you already have, many times over. If you just paid a contractor to build a 36 million dollar building and then found a problem. woudl you pay several thousand more to another contractor to fix it? Guess what, you have. That and a whole lot more. and that is because nobody in government is spending their money. that money belongs to no one. in fact it belongs to everyone. but nobody making the decision on how to spend it has that since they are paying for it. In the Government money just exists and nobody really knows how much their is. It gets used up like breathing air.

Here's something to think about: Medicare and Medicaid combined spend nearly $50 billion each year paying for nursing home care for the indigent elderly and disabled.

Would you be willing to take Mom, Dad, Grandma, etc., into your home and care for them in order to reduce this expense?

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

Yes, if they refunded all of the money that the parent paid into the program.

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I am sure of two things: There is a God, and I am not Him.
The movie Rudy

I would be more than glad to take my dad into my home and care for him. Not so much for the expense factor... but just to make sure he is taken care of properly.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

I hear this quite a bit... do you not realize that money was spent... caring for other folks? I agree that SS and Medicare should be closed down at the federal level but there can be no "refunds" because there is no money to refund.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

Exactly!
So really, the question "what are you willing to give up".....this would not apply....because the govnt. has already TAKEN their money AND SPENT it.
I don't have a choice of getting it back or giving it up........it's gone.
And not a dime of what I / They paid into will they see......no matter how hard they worked all their lives and how much they paid in.

It was GIVEN to so many who did not pay in, and are not even legal citizens of my country.

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I am sure of two things: There is a God, and I am not Him.
The movie Rudy

Hmmm. It's a bit late for that, I fear, since the money they paid in over the years was used to settle the claims of the people needing assistance at the time. That's generally how insurance works.

But let's say we discontinued the programs today, or made them optional. How many people do you think would faithfully contribute approximately the same amount to a private retirement plan, and would retire with a nest egg sufficient to provide for their care? (Looking at the data on Americans' retirement savings is not very encouraging.)

The result would be a large percentage of the elderly going into retirement with very modest assets and no government assistance. They would be, to use an old saying, "a burden on their children," if they were so fortunate as to have some willing to take them in.

But we could certainly reduce government spending ...

(BTW, this example came to mind because my husband is facing this situation with his elderly mother right now.)

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

Thank you for that. Your personal life is much like mine. No new cars, cash for everything, we get what we need, not everything we want.

I skipped that to concentrate on the government part of your post. I wish more people DID realize how our tax money is spent. If they did, maybe they would either demand more accountability or cut the tax money off altogether.
Rather than an OWS type demonstration, perhaps us taxpayers could refuse to pay our taxes until the or unless the government made the cuts and spent the rest of it wisely.
It would be an act of civil disobedience, more than that, a jailable offense. It would be VERY disruptive (if enough had the guts) and it might prove far more effective than all the OWS combined. You see, it's not the breaking of these sham "laws" that upset me, it's the fact that it isn't working towards the intended goals - and the lack of specific goals.
So I guess to answer the OP's question, I would be willing, just for starters, to give up the entire dept of the IRS.
Here's to hoping in the New Year>

And? (as in whose fault would that be?)

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

Almost everybody already has drawn more money than they put into the system in the first place

How do you figure?

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I am sure of two things: There is a God, and I am not Him.
The movie Rudy

I was kinda wondering the same thing myself. Now if there was some qualifier like "almost everyone who has been on SS for 10 or more years" there may be something to it... but just "almost everybody"?????

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

Certainly you can blame the elderly person who didn't save or invested poorly, but blame isn't particularly useful. What do you suggest we do with 80-something people who no longer can take care of themselves? Should one spouse quit their job and stay home to take care of the elderly parent(s)? What if they are the sole breadwinner in the family? Back in the day, prior to Social Security, I suppose that's how it was done, but people didn't tend to live as long as they do now.

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"I love all of this mud," said no one, ever.

People should take care of themselves... or when they no longer can then family members should step up to the plate. And you are correct.... back in the day before SS people took care of their own business and those that did it properly did quite well. Those that did not take care of their business wound up as charity cases and went to poor farms to live out their days. (and it wasnt my fault) As to what we should do with eighty somethings who can no longer afford to live at home.... there should be family members willing to take care of them, and for those few with no family.... again, we have charitable organizations clamoring for a chance to help the needy.

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"Nothing so needs reforming as other peoples habits." Mark Twain

So, it's your contention that each of us is responsible for anyone who didn't plan ahead for retirement? Isn't that the crux of the issue?

As to the second part of your statement, yes, that's exactly how it should be. I admit to living a modern lifestyle, separate from my parents. But, I'm not sure that is the best thing for society as a whole. I live in Amish country in central PA. They have a much better handle on family life & old age than we do. Our parents can live with us, and assist with the household and child rearing for many years after retirement. The parents build an addition on the house to afford privacy, and yet be close to the family. They don't consider their parents a "burden". It seems that they are "blessed" to have their parents to share their experience with them, and help around the house & farm. Of course, you realize that the Amish also don't believe in insurance, so most of those issues that command center stage at our political debates are moot to them.

That would be the model I'd use.

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The government can't give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
--Dr. Adrian Rogers

Back before ss was started few people had to pay water/sewer bills or electric bills. Few people had access to hospitals. Very few people had cars. Most employers offered a pension plan. Living expenses on the whole were much less than they are now.

Those who oppose social security should really check into the history behind it. Govts have been taking care of the poor, the old, the infirm, orphans and widows as long as govts have existed.