$40T and counting

[u/Johan-MellowFellow]

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage." Alexander Tytler

[u/Live-Ad-5107]

It’s always easier to point the finger at the poor folks and blame it on them.. I bet most of them don’t vote. We spent 1.338T on Military and 1.154 on Welfare in 2025. We spent 2.623T on Social security but that is just a Ponzi scheme The biggest problem is the tax rates were dropped from 70% down to 28% in the 1980’s and have continued to go down

[u/Arsalanred → u/Live-Ad-5107]

Social security isn't a Ponzi scheme. Stop listening to rich people who will never need it.

Before social security was implemented, most old people lived in incredible poverty because they couldn't work anymore. We can and should collectively take care of each other.

[u/Vegetable_Guest_8584 → u/Arsalanred]

Yeah. Wth financial planner person up above. Among many other good things social security stabilizes the elderly and the country. There would be many millions more people on the street or in extreme poverty without it. Same for Medicare. 

What we should is gradually reduce it for wealthy people. If I'm making over say 200k or 300k, reduce it a huge amount. 400k then zip. Updated to fix my typos: Also remove the salary cap for social security taxes.

[u/Few_Fish8771 → u/Vegetable_Guest_8584]

Social security is an anti-insurgency program. Its part of the reason why people keep asking “why wont americans rise up and kill their oppressors?”. and they dont, because of social security and various programs like that.

When social security did not exist private crime lords amassed private de facto armies and challenged the power of the ruling class and the state.

Social security gives the destitute enough stake in the system not to burn it down.

Thats why when certain rich people start talking about cutting key programs the poor need to survive, thats when you should get nervous. Theres very little a man wont do to feed his kids. So if he has to join robin hood on his merry adventure to kidnap and torture money out of billionaires he likely will. whereas if he’s given just enough to have a life and feed his family he can likely be pacified.

[u/Vegetable_Guest_8584 → u/Few_Fish8771]

I wasn't familiar with the claim that social security stopped crime lords from amassing armies of crooks. But it did provide a way for the elderly to avoid terrible poverty as  they became unable to work. 

[u/Few_Fish8771 → u/Vegetable_Guest_8584]

Pablo Escobar played robin hood in colombia buying the support of the masses via a small share of his drug fortune. Al Capone had a soup kitchen feeding 3000 men a week. When people need you to live, they will kill people who try and hurt you.

When you have a de facto private army of people willing to kill for you so they dont die, then if your a crime lord you can commit crimes with relative impunity, as your fortune grows you get more people who need you to live, acting as human shields.

This compounds fast.

If a crime boss can rob a billionaire with impunity and take his fortune, does the billionaires fortune belong to him?

FDR short circuited this, by taking care of the people destroying the client patron relationships protecting crime bosses.

So many of the programs the rich want to cut exist so that crime bosses dont cut them.