Posts Tagged ‘ social security ’

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Forget Retirement And Retirement Savings

May 4th, 2012 | By | Category: Featured, Personal Investing
Retirement is a marketing construct. You've been sold a bill of goods for the last few decades of your life. You've been told that nation-states, democracy and socialism are good. You've been told our monetary system prevents instability. And -- while the government and central banks put your unborn children or ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Personal Investing | 4 comments


Anti-Authoritarianism Starts Within

Apr 11th, 2012 | By | Category: Featured, Politics
Mainstream "conservatism" gets no traction because it's often so obviously hypocritical. It provides the shells necessary for the authoritarian opposition (they like to call themselves "liberals," which is sort of accurate in that they are very liberal with other people's money) to shellac the conservatives at will and make them ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Politics | 12 comments


Did Anyone Really Think the Supercommittee Would Make a Difference?

Nov 21st, 2011 | By | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
Stick a fork in the debt supercommittee. Because just in time for Thanksgiving, that dumb bird is done. "WASHINGTON (AP) — It's just about over for a special deficit-reduction supercommittee, which appears set to admit failure on Monday, in its quest to sop up at least $1.2 trillion in government red ...read more

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Posted in Economics, Featured, Politics | 4 comments


Ponzi Social Security Pays It Ever Forward

Aug 18th, 2011 | By | Category: Economics, Featured, Personal Investing
A regular Whiskey bar patron writes: I truly do enjoy your insights on the Whiskey & Gunpowder posts. These ideas are very much in tune with what is going on. But why do you and others insist that Social Security is somehow an entitlement? No matter what the immoral politicians did ...read more

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Posted in Economics, Featured, Personal Investing | 11 comments


Never Retire

Mar 14th, 2011 | By | Category: Economics, Featured, Personal Investing
Before the mid 1950s, there was no “retirement” as we use the term today. A 1950 poll showed most workers aspired to work for as long as possible. Quitting was for the disabled. Life did not offer “twilight years,” two decades of uninterrupted leisure courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer. Just since ...read more

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Posted in Economics, Featured, Personal Investing | 12 comments


Avoiding the Looming Disaster of Social Security

Aug 25th, 2010 | By | Category: Featured, Macro Economics, Politics
Because of failure to heed the limitations of the U.S. Constitution, which has produced runaway federal spending, our nation sits on the precipice of disaster. Former Senator Alan Simpson of Wyoming and Erskine Bowles, White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, co-chairmen of President Obama’s debt and deficit ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Macro Economics, Politics | 26 comments


When We Could Afford the Welfare Scheme of Social Security

Apr 8th, 2010 | By | Category: Economics, Featured, Politics
Every generation scolds the next one down the line and blames society’s ills on the guy up at bat. Considering past policy decisions, this common perspective doesn’t make much sense. Just look at the Great Depression generation, both known for its great character as well as the worst policies of ...read more

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Posted in Economics, Featured, Politics | 7 comments


I Stand Corrected!

Apr 2nd, 2010 | By | Category: Featured, Morning Whiskey
Some of my readers pointed out, kindly but sternly, that I am living in the past in a way I hadn't considered. Muchas gracias, crew, for demonstrating vividly that I can be at least as dense as the next racist, homophobic, intolerant, Neanderthal, semi-literate redneck. (I am always fascinated by how ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Morning Whiskey | 26 comments


Excerpt from “The Hard Math of Demography”

Aug 6th, 2009 | By | Category: Featured, Macro Economics
Social Security? Not Exactly The first public retirement pension scheme was created by Otto von Bismarck in 1880 Germany. Fifty years later, during the Great Depression, Franklin Roosevelt followed suit in the United States. As we’ve seen, the number of people expected to reach the retirement age of 65 was not ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Macro Economics | 8 comments


Bernie, Ponzi and Social Security

Jul 7th, 2009 | By | Category: Featured, Morning Whiskey
You all know by now that Bernie Madoff was given a 150-year sentence for perpetrating a $65 Billion Ponzi scheme. That’s 145 years more than the original Charles Ponzi received on November 1, 1920. And Ponzi only served 3-1/2 years of that sentence in the Federal Penitentiary. After being released, ...read more

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Posted in Featured, Morning Whiskey | 3 comments


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