Social Security for legislators

[XMEN Gambit]

You've heard me say it before and I'll say it again. But in any case, I got this in an email today. I hate pass-it-along email campaigns so I'll compromise and post it here.
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IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU ARE REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT!
KEEP IT GOING!!!!

2008 Election Issue!!

GET A BILL STARTED TO PLACE ALL POLITICIANS ON SOC. SEC.
This must be an issue in "2008 ". Please! Keep it going.

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SOCIAL SECURITY:
(This is worth reading. It is short and to the point)

Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions during election years.

Our Senators and Congresswomen do not pay into Social Security and, of course, they do not collect from it.

You see, Social Security benefits were not suitable for persons of their rare elevation in society. They felt they should have a special plan for themselves. So, many years ago they voted in their own benefit plan .

In more recent years, no congress person has felt the need to change it. After all, it is a great plan.

For all practical purposes their plan works like this:
When they retire, they continue to draw the same pay until they die.

Except it may increase from time to time for cost of living adjustments..

This is calculated on an average life span for each of those two Dignitaries For example, Senator Byrd and Congressman White and their wives may expect to draw $7,800,000.00 (that's Seven Million, Eight-Hundred Thousand Dollars), with their wives drawing $275,000.00 during the last years of their lives.


Younger Dignitaries who retire at an early age, will receive much more during the rest of their lives.

Their cost for this excellent plan is $0.00. NADA...ZILCH...

This little perk they voted for themselves is free to them. You and I pick up the tab for this plan. The funds for this fine retirement plan come directly from the General Funds:

"OUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK"!

From our own Social Security Plan, which you and I pay (or have paid) into, -- every payday until we retire (which amount is matched by our employer) -- we can expect to get an average of $1,000 per month after retirement.

Or, in other words, we would have to collect our average of $1,000 monthly benefits for 68 years and one (1) month to equal Senator! Bill Bradley's benefits!

Social Security could be very good if only one small change were made.

That change would be to jerk the Golden Fleece Retirement Plan from under the Senators and Congressmen. Put them into the Social Security plan with the rest of us, then sit back and watch how fast they would fix it.

If enough people receive this, maybe a seed of awareness will be planted and maybe good changes will evolve.

[Spinning Hat]

While I agree that Congress' retirement plan is a little (OK a LOT) over the top, drawing the same pay, I do not ever expect to collect Social Security by the time I retire. Even if they were to fix it. It's too broken to fix effectively. It'll be dead in not too long I think, and it's sad. Thee are a lot of people out there, Blue Collar workers who have nothing more than that, because their companies' Pension folded, or they had no means to save for a retirement, and it's sad, and Social Security is necessary for them, and millions of others who're disabled, or for the surviving children of a dead parent, to help replace that income that was lost when their parent died. My mom got SS checks for my brother and me for 14 years after my dad died, until we both turned 18 and graduated HS. It was the only thing keeping a roof over our heads, and food in our stomachs at times.

It's a good thing, but something doomed to failure, not because of congress' retirement plan, but their robbing from the SS fund time and again to try and fix other things. Social Security is dead.