dagblog - Comments for "CPI Unchained Open Thread"

According to what I've read,

Aaron Carine — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 20:41:46 +0000

In reply to Depends on what he means by

According to what I've read, switching to CPI would mean a little cut--maybe a hundred a year--in the benefits of younger seniors. Obama hasn't said anything specific about that. A substantial cut would occur when recipients were in their eighties, but Obama says he would take measures to prevent that--probably the Simpson-Bowles measures.

Oh yeah, this is just a great

ocean-kat — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 18:13:26 +0000

In reply to CPI Unchained Open Thread

Oh yeah, this is just a great political move by Obama. It will show just how intransigent republicans are on taxes. Unless the republicans run against the SS cuts and portray themselves as the protectors of seniors and SS. Of course they would never ever be that craven.

BLITZER: Let's get some Republican reaction to what we just heard from the President of the United States. Representative Greg Walden of Oregon is joining us right now. He's the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Congressman, what did you think of the president's remarks?

REP. GREG WALDEN (R-OR), CHAIRMAN, NRCC: Well, I thought it very intriguing in that the budget really lays out kind of a shocking attack on seniors, if you will. And we haven't seen all the detail yet, and we'll look at it, but I'll tell you, when you're going after seniors the way he's already done on Obamacare, taking $700 billion out of Medicare to put into Obamacare, and now coming back at seniors again, I think you're crossing that line very quickly here in terms of denying access to seniors for health care in districts like mine, certainly, and around the country. I think he's going to have a lot of pushback from some of the major senior organizations on this and Republicans, as well.

And this is a budget that doesn't balance. At the end of the day, you can have all the flowery rhetoric, but I'm a numbers guy and this doesn't add up. It does not balance. We've passed the Ryan budget. It does balance in ten years; it will put us on a path to grow the economy and jobs. And, again, gets us to where we have a balanced budget. This is 65 days late and it doesn't add up.

BLITZER: Well, let's talk about these proposed changes that the president is putting forward when it comes to Social Security and Medicare, the shocking proposals that you say the president's putting forward that could affect seniors. What's so shocking about changing that CPI, that consumer price index the way that you would determine how much inflation would go ahead with increases for Social Security recipients, for example?

WALDEN: Well, once again, you're trying to balance this budget on the backs of seniors and I just think it's not the right way to go.

Yeah, when someone owes me

PeraclesPlease — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 16:49:21 +0000

In reply to The problem should at the

Yeah, when someone owes me money but decides he'll pay me in 3 months rather than next week, always makes me happy. In that case though it's the same amount - it's figuring out what the interest rate should have been, often not there for personal loans.

In this case, it's the government hoping I die first before I collect too much, so slow-balling odds are ever in their favor, as Effie from Hunger Games would say.

The problem should at the

A Guy Called LULU — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 15:37:47 +0000

In reply to CPI Unchained Open Thread

The problem should at the very least be framed correctly. I keep seeing figures estimating how much the government will "save" by adjustments to S.S. That is like saying that my bank would save money if it didn't have to return the full amount that I had put into a savings account. S.S. is in a dedicated fund which has been paid for. It would have been a bit dumb to put the billions collected for that fund under a mattress somewhere while borrowing that many additional billions from China, so the money was lent to our government.instead. Still, that debt, held in bonds, is exactly as legitimate as the ones bought by creditors all over the world. Nobody is suggesting that our government could legitimately save a lot of money by defaulting on our debt owed to other countries or by arbitrarily change the terms of repayment. Yet.

Depends on what he means by

Resistance — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 13:53:08 +0000

In reply to Right now, I believe Obama

Depends on what he means by major? Why is Obama even talking cuts; at all. We need more revenue; so take the caps off all types of income. Make everyone pay the premium, for this SS insurance, even if they'll never use it and if they dont like it ....Tough

Right now, I believe Obama

Aaron Carine — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 12:50:44 +0000

In reply to CPI Unchained Open Thread

Right now, I believe Obama when he says he will take measures to prevent major cuts in Social Security benefits under chained CPI. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong.

My point was not that women

Anonymous PP — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 10:56:11 +0000

In reply to (No subject)

My point was not that women aren't organized and fight back - the point was they have trouble getting heard and followed by the boys' club in Washington. I'll be thrilled if they can get CPI shit-canned, and even more thrilled if they can get Washington to focus on jobs and growth, and not job-killing austerity.

(oddly enough, our brainiacs are over in Europe telling them to not do austerity, because they have to grow their way out of the recession. Amazing simple Keynesian medicine can't fly for a domestic audience)

(No subject)

trkingmomoe — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 08:56:35 +0000

In reply to The growing sisterhood of

Please. I hope I'm not

Flavius — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 00:28:17 +0000

In reply to Packing the Simpson Bowles

Please. I hope I'm not disingenuous.Dumb possibly. In fact almost certainly. But not disingenuous. That's above my grade in pay.

I'm happy to admit that I have no inside knowledge of what forms current intellectual argument . Certainly W thought social security was in play when he began his second term with a brief ineffective campaign to privatize it. But how could it not be on the table for the Right Commentariat. Every minute, every day.. It's good for the poor and the elderly. Horrors !

I don't want to believe anything but the best about social security. But it's been in danger ever since the New Yorker cartoon with someone suggesting "Let's go down to the Translux and boo Roosevelt." Some time in 1938.

Bingo!

SleepinJeezus — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 21:48:20 +0000

In reply to Packing the Simpson Bowles

Bingo!