re: Joe really touched some nerves

quote:

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Sociel Security is not a retirement fund or an investment. It is a tax and an entitlement.

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It's actually none of the above.

FDR needed to raise revenue. As the country/world was in Depression, wide-base tax increases were not a political option. A large revenue bond drive was not a feasible option. FDR & Co explored various ways to incentivize bond purchase (as they later did during WWII). But nothing along those lines was realistically practicable in the mid-1930's economy.

So various mandates were explored instead. The one arrived at was a 50:50 employer:employee contributional mandate. Essentially it was a corporate tax, and workers' forced participation in a bond-like government borrow-repayment program. Pay-in would occur over an employee's entire work life. Allocated pay-out would only occur beginning at retirement (65y), and terminating at death (life expectancy 58y M, 62y W). At a ~15X worker to retiree ratio, the program drew in far more revenue than it paid out.

It was perhaps the slickest political move in US history. FDR got his needed funding. Meanwhile, by labeling SS a retirement security benefit, he was hailed as a workers' hero.