Tag Archives: Welfare-Warfare State

Detroit’s City Pensioners Finally Figure It Out After 40 Years: No Pensions.

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Detroit’s City Pensioners Finally Figure It Out After 40 Years: No Pensions.

“Fiscal conservatives have said for years that this was inevitable. We were dismissed as crackpots. The red ink could flow forever, we were told. ‘No problem!’ They say the same thing today about the federal government. The suckers line up for jobs with the federal government, with its fat pensions and unfunded liabilities. The result will be the same: default. Cities can do what individuals do: run up large bills, and then declare bankruptcy. The voters will shrug off 20,000 pensioners who lived in a fantasy world all their lives. They are no longer politically viable. They are merely a tiny voting bloc that has no money to give to campaigns.”

http://teapartyeconomist.com/2013/07/22/detroits-city-pensioners-finanally-figure-it-out-after-40-years-no-pensions/

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Public Sector Pensions Are a National Issue

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“Paul Krugman and Dean Baker took the Washington Post editorial page to task yesterday for stating that unfunded state and local pension liabilities amounted to $3.8 trillion. They accuse the page of misquoting a study in which the total was cited as only $1 trillion. Currently, standard practice measures the funding status of public pensions in the US under the laughable assumption that every dollar in the pension funds will earn compound returns of 7.75% or 8% per year. That’s the basis for the $1 trillion in unfunded liabilities.  If unfunded liabilities are $1.0 trillion under an 8% rate, then they are $3.4 trillion unfunded under a 4% rate.”

http://www.advancingafreesociety.org/exclusive/topics/economics/public-sector-pensions-are-a-national-issue/

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Detroit’s City Pensioners Are Wiped Out.

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“This is the thing about impossible obligations. They get abandoned. This confirms economist Herbert Stein’s law: ‘When things can’t go on, they have a tendency to stop.’ A year ago, the experts denied that anything was wrong. Yes, there were ‘problems,’ but nothing that could not be fixed. ‘Bankruptcy? Are you serious? Of course not. There is no possibility of that. Such talk is inflammatory. Perish the thought.’ That’s what politicians always say . . . right up to the end. The pensioners will have to go back to work. They will be covered by Medicare only. They believed the politicians. They invested their working years in terms of promises made by politicians.”

http://teapartyeconomist.com/2013/07/19/detroitss-city-pensioners-are-wiped-out/

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101 Million Americans Received Food Aid Last Year

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“Nearly one-third of Americans received government-funded food aid in 2012, according to a new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). There are roughly a dozen federal food assistance programs operating today. The USDA reports that 59 percent of households that participated in one of the four largest food assistance programs—food stamps, school breakfasts, school lunches, and WIC—end up receiving benefits from ‘two or more programs.’ This indicates significant duplication, ‘providing participants total benefits in excess of 100 percent of daily nutritional needs.'”

http://blog.heritage.org/2013/07/18/101-million-americans-received-food-aid-last-year/

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Detroit Declares Bankruptcy; Citizen Layoffs Begin

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After decades of mismanagement, decay, and taxpayer flight led to one of the largest municipal bankruptcies in U.S. history Friday, city officials have begun circulating notices informing citizens that their continued residence would no longer be required.  “Look, there’s really no need to spell out what everyone knows: Detroiters are a net drain on the Detroit economy,” said city emergency manager Kevyn Orr.  “The city services they consume cost far in excess of what they can afford.  The sooner we complete this restructuring, which will unfortunately require a significant reduction in headcount, the sooner we will be back on track as a city.”

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City of Detroit Files for Chapter 9 Bankruptcy

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“If the Chapter 9 filing is approved, Detroit’s case would be the largest municipal bankruptcy in the history of the United States. The tax base has been destroyed.  Detroit lost a quarter-million residents between 2000 and 2010. A population that in the 1950s reached 1.8 million is struggling to stay above 700,000. Much of the middle-class and scores of businesses also have fled Detroit, taking their tax dollars with them. Likely those holding any of the $11 billion in unsecured debt will get next to nothing. Per person, the debt of the U.S. government ($54K/person) is about twice as large as the debt of the City of Detroit ($26K/person).”

http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2013/07/breaking-city-of-detroit-files-for.html

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10 things Social Security won’t tell you: The truth about the agency’s bottom line

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“About a third of workers in their 50s expect Social Security benefits to be their primary source of income in retirement.  The Social Security Administration itself has said that unless something is done to reform the system, it will have to reduce benefit payments to retirees within the next few decades.  Less talked about, perhaps, is the concern that the program is having a hard time paying its bills today. In 2010, the Social Security Administration began collecting less revenue in taxes than it needs to cover benefit payments, forcing the agency to tap its $2.7 trillion trust fund sooner than some had expected.”

http://www.marketwatch.com/Story/story/print?guid=E23DDC3E-E014-11E2-A2CC-002128040CF6

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Bill Bonner: The war on the young

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“Rules, regulations, restrictions – he doesn’t recall voting for a single one. Instead, they were imposed upon him. So were the costs of today’s omni-eternal state with claims – in the US alone — on (according to Niall Ferguson) some $238 trillion of future output.  Dear reader, between the time when we grew up and today the world has changed. It has been taken over by zombies, desperate to drain the future so they can enjoy it now. Old people get their benefits. Their laws. Their privileges. They get to have things more or less as they want them. And the young? Take it or leave it.  No wonder so many are trying to leave.”

http://www.equitymaster.com/dailyreckoning/detail.asp?date=07/18/2013&story=6&title=Young-in-France-are-leaving-the-country

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‘Pension Paupers’: Dream Time Collapses in Britain

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“Pensioners living on pocket money as savings crisis hits millions … Almost two million retired adults in the UK have less disposable income than the average 11 year-old, as Britain’s savings crisis creates a generation of ‘pension paupers’. A new survey last night said 15 per cent of men and women in retirement have an income of less than £154 a week, which falls to £8 after essential living costs. Insurance giant LV= claimed the situation was only likely to get worse as over 50s cut the amount they put into their pension pots to cope with the cost of living.”

http://www.thedailybell.com/29307/Dream-Time-Collapses-in-Britain

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Utah Spent $26K to Ferret Out Welfare Drug Users, Found Nine

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“Of 4,425 people screened for drug use after seeking aid, only 813 were deemed to be at high risk of drug use, only 394 were actually subjected to drug testing, and of those, only nine were denied benefits because they tested positive and five are undergoing treatment.  The state spent more than $26,000 to achieve these results. It spent more than $5,000 to administer the Substance Abuse Subtle Screening Inventory (SASSI) test to applicants and more than $20,000 to pay for drug testing. Those figures do not include staff costs to administer the SASSI test or the costs of drug treatment.”

http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2013/jul/11/utah_spent_26k_ferret_out_welfar

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