Obama has a lock on 5.4 million more votes in November. Why am I such a sucker? Why don’t I get myself laid off and collect two years of unemployment? Then when the unemployment ends I just use my diabetes diagnosis to get on SSDI for the rest of my life. It sounds like a can’t miss plan, and it’s only costing the American taxpayer $120 billion per year. It’s nice work if you can’t get it.
5.4 Million Join Disability Rolls Under Obama
By JOHN MERLINE, INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY Posted 04/20/2012 08:02 AM ET
A record 5.4 million workers and their dependents have signed up to collect federal disability checks since President Obama took office, according to the latest official government data, as discouraged workers increasingly give up looking for jobs and take advantage of the federal program.
This is straining already-stretched government finances while posing a long-term economic threat by creating an ever-growing pool of permanently dependent working-age Americans.
Since the recession ended in June 2009, the number of new enrollees to Social Security’s disability insurance program is twice the job growth figure. (See nearby chart.) In just the first four months of this year, 539,000 joined the disability rolls and more than 725,000 put in applications.
As a result, by April there were a total of 10.8 million people on disability, according to Social Security Administration data released this week. Even after accounting for all those who’ve left the program — about 700,000 drop out each year, mainly because they hit retirement age or died — that’s up 53% from a decade ago.
To be sure, disability rolls have grown steadily as a share of the workforce since the 1990s (see nearby chart).
The main causes of this broader trend, according to a study by economists David Autor and Mark Duggan, are the loosening of eligibility rules by Congress in 1984, the rise in disability benefits relative to wages, and the fact that more women have entered the workforce, making them eligible for disability.
Their research found that the aging of the population has contributed only modestly to the program’s growth.
But the big factor in the recent surge is the slow pace of the economic recovery after the severe recession. That has kept the unemployment rate above 8% and created an enormous pool of long-term unemployed and discouraged workers. More than 5 million people have been jobless for 27 weeks or more, nearly twice the previous high set in 1983, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“We see a lot of people applying for disability once their unemployment insurance expires,” said Matthew Rutledge, a research economist at Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research.
The number of applications last year was up 24% compared with 2008, Social Security Administration data show.
As the Congressional Budget Office explained : “When opportunities for employment are plentiful, some people who could quality for (disability insurance) benefits find working more attractive … when employment opportunities are scarce, some of these people participate in the DI program instead.”
The explosive growth in disability enrollment also “helps explain some of the drop in the labor force participation rate,” noted economist Ed Yardeni on his blog.
In fact, the participation rate — the share of working-age people who have or are looking for a job — has fallen to 63.8% compared with 65.7% at the start of Obama’s term.
Ironically, this drives down the unemployment rate, which simply measures how many people are looking for work but haven’t been able to find it. When people quit looking or sign up for disability benefits, they no longer count as unemployed.
The problem is that few people who get on disability will ever participate in the labor force again. In fact, the vast bulk of those who exit Social Security Disability Insurance do so either because they hit retirement age or died.
As a result, the swelling ranks of the disabled can become a drag on the economy.
A White House report late last year noted that because “workers on SSDI rarely return to the labor force,” this can result “in a loss to society of the economic contribution those workers could have made.”
What’s more, the explosive growth in enrollment is not only increasing the financial strain on the Social Security Disability Insurance trust fund — which is scheduled to go bankrupt in 2018 — it’s boosting costs for Medicare as well, since SSDI enrollees can qualify for Medicare after two years. SSDI now accounts for more than 16% of Social Security’s budget and more than 15% of Medicare’s.
Reform ideas that would cut the ranks of those on disability have been bandied about for years. They include tightening eligibility rules, giving workers more options other than full-time disability and offering tax incentives for disabled workers to stay in the workforce.
The reforms so far have spurred little action. But with the program’s bankruptcy looming just a few years off, and with the economy showing no signs of producing a surge in jobs, that indifference to reform may soon have to change.
Proud member of the SSDI Free Shit Army
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I keep hearing about people doing this…
There’s serious disabilities and those I question…. and the latter will serve to only create un-needed difficulty for the former.
Yet nobody gives a shit about overall consequences. A shame.
Yeah…and Paul Ryan is a cocksucker for wanting to cut these programs.
A critical thinking person might ask why SSDI enrollment is surging if the government regulations have made our workplaces safer and advances in healthcare have made us healthier.
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It really does not matter anymore, we are fucked. Trying to explain things like this to everyday sheep can be quite the challenge. Most of them just look at you with a strange look and then change the subject to something real important like Trayon who ever the fuck he is. Every person I know who is on SSDI and should not be I give pure hell. Some feel quilty but most just say either I deserve it or I already payed into SS so just getting my money back.
I would rather work for a living, guess my parents weren’t thinking when they were raising me. Thanks Mom and Dad.
Most of my cancer patients either are cured, and thus do not need SSDI, or they die before the 2 year waiting period and never get it.
However, occasionally I see patients who have gotten SSDI for “depression” or “back pain” who then get a cancer and I have to schedule their treatments around their cruises or vacations, fucking aggro I’m telin’ you, because their pre-cancer disability was bullshit.
I’m sorry, but disability is when you have no arms or legs, or a serious mental problem like schizophrenia or severe autism – not because you are shoving food down the piehole and weight 400 pounds.
I don’t understand your bitter hatred toward Obama and the casting of blame onto him — as if none of these problems existed until he came along and as if throwing stones is going to make life better for anyone. It’s a waste of energy and reflects on your low opinion of and regard for your own time and energy — your life. These societal problems are bigger than Obama and yours and everyone else’s desire to improve them and put things back the way they were 50 years ago. A tidal wave was washing over America before Obama took the oathe of office. Problems is, the way we have lived is not sustainable, and the grab-off of the greedy and power-monging rich is way out of proportion. It can’t be swept under the rug anymore. The tyrants have to go.
Also, this “Proud member of the SSDI Free Shit Army” picture (above) is bogus. You’re taking one picture of one poor unfortunate soul and trying to distort and manipulating people’s opinions about disability recipients. There are a lot of older people (and not so old) working jobs that are destroying their knees. I say, change the jobs to reflect that we are human and that the body is not capable of standing 8-10 hours every work day for 20, 30, 40 years. The body breaks down, pain sets in, and people got depressed and, unfortunately, gain lots of weight and lose hope. You don’t know her story. But we all know the greedy and wealthy businessman and politician’s story: take take take. What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable. If you’re going to blame, be smart as to where the blame should go. It goes to the greedy, power-mongers who have been in power for as long as there have been oppressors and think the rest of us are dirt.
ama
So Solly. The surge in SSDI since 2008 didn’t happen because people suddenly got bad knees. The proportionate increase PROVES there is massive fraudulent SSDI applications being made. Wake up from your stupor and deal with reality. I know its hard, but try.
The Free Shit Army Marches on.
ama
Are you capable of understanding a chart. Take a long hard look at that chart. From 1977 until 1991 spending on SSDI was flat. Under Bill Clinton they made it easier to qualify. If the Free Shit Army can get something for free that doesn’t require working they’ll sign up.
We don’t buy your one-sided bullshit.
Obesity caused by eating fast food is not a disability.
Getting depressed because your two years of unemployment has run out is not a disability.
@ama: Yes, we have a visceral hatred for politicians who are pathological liars about the dire state of the country and whose policies seem designed to take us right into the abyss.
Yes, we, as taxpayers, have every right to condemn people who weight 400 pounds and then expect the taxpayers to pay for their healthcare, housing, motorized scooter and, drum roll please, MORE FOOD.
Yes, we, as the producing class, have very little sympathy for people who cave in to the least little problem in life, give up and expect everyone else to support them because “life is so hard and unfair”.
Yes, we, on the TBP, are fully aware of the full scale looting and fraud at the highest levels of financial/political circles.
Perhaps you missed it, ama, but this site is all about personal responsibility, accountability and self suficiency. Try it sometime, you might just like it.
If the Free Shit Army can get something for free that doesn’t require working they’ll sign up. -admin
I sent a letter to Benny Bankee and Timmeh and asked them when I could come pick up my ten million zirpo bankees to invest in Timmehs 2% shop to fix the housing bubble. I also asked Obama why he didnt fix the housing crisis.
.
Obesity caused by eating fast food is not a disability. -admin
I could argue oh hell I will that it is a disability as all these fast food restaurants are designed for hover rounds which proves that obesity is not caused by the food eaten but by access to that food which causes obesity. McDonalds, and its co-conspirators, should be held accountable for this mass inducing disease that is ravaging our society and the Secret Service scandal. And the Buffet rule. Fuck Google.
Nature dictates that all organisms are in competition with other organisms for scarce resources. That is true for humans too. When the only tools you have with which to compete is a disability form, then that’s what you use. It sucks, its unjust, but it is what it is. Back when life was nasty, brutish, and short, you used a sword.
There are too many humans with too few tasks for all of them to do. Unless there is a big die-off, this is the new normal. We gotta get used to it. At least, this is what I tell myself daily so I don’t scream myself hoarse.
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Like this Bullock?
“You’re taking one picture of one poor unfortunate soul and trying to distort and manipulating people’s opinions about disability recipients.” ….ama
Nobody distorts or manipulates anything on here. Are you trying to replace me as the joke punching bag?
Dave Dumbfuck is irreplaceable as the joke punching bag village idiot of TBP.
Ama can actually make a comment without copying and pasting someone else’s comment.
“The proportionate increase PROVES there is massive fraudulent SSDI applications being made.”
Ama, it’s the greedy 1% that is filing all of these fraudulent claims. The 99% are too poor and oppressed to do anything like that.
Dave Dumbfuck proves once again he can’t keep two true concepts in his pea brain at the same time. What a maroon.
Must be an east coast thing,out west its hard to get.Ive known people who are really injured and have tried for years.Heart attacks,ruptured disks and diabetes dosent mean shit here,mabe if you had a stroke or had your legs amputated.
When i see the money used overseas by our military and civilian contractors its hard to feel bad about helping out sick and injured people here in our country.
Yeah…and Paul Ryan is a cocksucker for wanting to cut these programs. -DaveL
I agree. Even without these cuts included.
Try again Randy. The dramatic upturn started in the early 1990s as soon as Clinton made it easier to get on SSDI. The oldest Boomer was 50 years old and the youngest was 30.
Why the surge in 2008? You honestly believe millions of Americans suddenly became disabled as soon as they lost their jobs.
It looks like we have a lot of Free Shit Army fans today.
SSDI will be bankrupt by 2018 at the latest. Where do you propose the money to pay for this ever growing Free Shit Army come from?
Are you FSA fans offering to pay another 2% of your pay so lazy ass obese people can sit home and watch the O network?
” I also asked Obama why he didnt fix the housing crisis.” – KB
Apparently, at least according to ama, it’s not his job to fix anything.
If so, then I’ll be damned if I know what IS the job of the POTUS.
(Funny tho, I would swear his campaign slogan was something about “Change”.)
randy
If manufacturing has been automated, what repetitive duties are the senior people doing that is causing permanent disbailities? Filing paper? Typing numbers into a computer? Talking on the phone? Cruising the internet?
Is your post serious or a joke?
Admin – you beat me to it. You were nicer than I was going to be. Randy, you are clueless. The days of heavy repetition are almost over. Those jobs are, and are being, automated. Health and safety laws are eradicating them as well. Plus the idea that seniority rules is a lie. Perhaps in a heavy union world, but otherwise people are generally let go in reverse order to their value to the business. Plus absent union agreements, using seniority to make decisons can be classified age discrimination (discrimination against the young isn’t allowed, either.). You really need to know something about what you post before you post.
Everyone – I apologize for my hiatus. I have a range of personal issues that are preventing me from participating. I will be a sporadic poster at best for a while. Keep up the good work.
llpoh
I was really getting worried when you hadn’t posted. I’m glad you’re OK.
Don’t worry. DaveL is filling in admirably for you and Stuck.
Llpoh: Glad you aren’t gone. The lack of Big Dogs was alarming.
Look: It’s obvious… people are unemployed and the classifications for disability have been widened. I know two of the spectrums personally. Both unemployed, but one is suffering real, bonafide post-polio and can’t do a lot of things anymore…. the other a drunkard, ciggy-smoking stoner who has diabetes and falling apart. Both are Boomers.
Politics aside…. my sympathies are limited for one, but extended to the other. The shame is that both will have to fight the same fight for the same benefit. One could feesibly change his habits NOW and get by doing SOMETHING, the other is just waiting for legs to give way going to the bathroom at night.
Priorities. Without them we’re ring-around-the-rosies til we all fall down.
“A record 5.4 million workers and their dependents have signed up to collect federal disability checks “, “This is straining already-stretched government finances ”
I CALL BULLSHIT on all of the above. It doesn’t “strain” anything at all under the current counterfeit run system that merely prints more money to pay any and all so as to make as many as possible of the so called citizens of this used-to-be great country dependent on the Central Elite system that currently calls the shots.
We are fucked, dead standing, just haven’t fallen over yet. When we do, it may be with a sign and a fearful yowling or it may be a 3 AM on Sunday morning announcement of martial law, closed banks and confiscation of wealth. Who knows?
All I DO KNOW is that all central state welfare schemes collapse sooner or later and the result is either revolt, war (as a distraction) or anarchy. I suspect war (as a distraction) will be tried first before total destruction of the currency is a reality.
But what do I know is that things continue to get worse, more convoluted and I still mourn for my America.
MA
Muck About says: “We are fucked, dead standing, just haven’t fallen over yet.”
Not even close to dead Muck. Not as long as two African-Americans can file a discrimination lawsuit against the Batchelor TV show, because there has never been a black finalist. Plenty of time left before the fucking is completed. Lots of lawyers and race baiters would have to die first.
“Administrator says:
Dave Dumbfuck is irreplaceable as the joke punching bag village idiot of TBP.”
Jesus, will you make up your mind. D you want me dead and gone or do you want me here to be your punching bag? I’m so confused.
I think Obama should gather a list of Dave Dumbfuck’s best comments as his argument for Death Panels. I think support would skyrocket.
“The Czech government faces a test of its ability to continue governing after an ambitious fiscal tightening programme splintered the ruling coalition and brought tens of thousands of protesters on to the streets of Prague at the weekend.”
Muck, the end won’t come until we have an attempt at a similar type of austerity here. And then we’ll see the 51% FSA turn on the rest of the 99%, because there is sure as shit ain’t enough available from the 1% to keep the FSA going.
….because there is sure as shit ain’t enough available from the 1% to keep the FSA going. -DaveL
The bank bailouts, here and abroad totaled some 26 trillion, IIRC. They didnt have enough then either.
Interesting debates as always. I remember a 60 minutes or Dateline show that was about SSDI. The social workers and school district counselors in Louisiana were getting kids and parents “crazy checks”. The school systems suddenly received lots of federal money because the students were disabled. I just thought the kids were fat and stupid. Fruit doesn’t fall far from the trees. The welfare was getting the fat and stupid parents on disability to get around 1996 welfare reform act. It shifted the cost to the feds and away from the state.
I was not surprised that nothing has been done in 15 years or so. As usual the administrator in D.C. “promises” to look into this situation and nothing is done. I think also this system has lots of lawyers looking to represent you when your claim is denied. I have no idea what their cutis but it must be enough. Like everything else: of, buy(sic) and for the lawyers.
just thought the kids were fat and stupid -BTmf
I concur I refer to them as Xers and Mlls
Everyone – I apologize for my hiatus -llpoh
Just glad to see you can still fog a mirror. No apology required, ever.
You keep the people happy or its piano wire time. Just close one or two dumbass military bases.
Or in Obamas thinking just print more money.
Ill tell you when you have a job and your life is going good for you.Your just not as sympathetic or realistic about others whos life is a real SOB right now.
No, it isn’t paper filing. And yes I’m talking about heavily unionized industries as those are the blue collar jobs that have the best pay, benefits, saftey, and retirement schemes.
I lost an auto-job of 10 years. when I first started, i was assembling in the wheel area, attaching a knuckle to the frame. Almost 500 all day everyday. I had to retrieve a part, hold it in one hand and use a tool to attatch it.
Now the knuckle assembly comes in pre assembled as a full axel assembly with brakes and all. One person, with maybe 20 years seniority uses an ergo arm to lift the assembly into place. 30 jobs replaced by one. And one person who ends up injured from pushing and pulling an ergo arm back and forth 50 times a day.
by the time that worker will retire, they will end up leaving early, with a disability bridge to full retirement.
Those 30 jobs outsourced will all pay less than half, or even less if ofshored, and those jobs will end up injuring workers because of less saftey protection, which is the norm, in lower tier auto jobs.
Placing the blame on those collecting less than $2000 a month who, in your eyes, maybe gaming the system, releases those with whom the blame should reside.
Executives, management and shareholders who at every turn – chose profit over employment fairness, and saftey, AND who at every other turn, look to absolve themselves and their companies of having to pay their fair share to live in a free and democratic society.
You can blame those gaming the system for pennies, but where is your outrage at those who game the system for hundreds of millions?
The free shit army seems to be to me the Corzines, the Dimonds, the Goldman Sachs and BP…
PRIOTITIES PEOPLE!
anyway…
Correction
And one person who ends up injured from pushing and pulling an ergo arm back and forth 500 times a day.
I’ll have to agree with Randy’s last posts about manufacturing workers being treated like shit while being paid less and less, then ending up laid off and broken. Sounds pretty much like my ride the past few years. If all these corporations and executives continue to get BILLIONS in gov giveaways, why the fuck shouldn’t I file for SSDI when my neck got fucked up on the job and the company weaseled out of any responsibility? Between unemployment and SSDI, I’ll end up with just about the same income level as when I actually could get a job that doesn’t include fries and a nametag. Why make my injuries worse by being used by another fascist bunch of corporate liars and thieves then get thrown away at the first sign of a threat to some stuffed suit’s bonus?
Randy,
I tend to agree with you. Around my neck of the woods there are quite a few folks on disability. There are a few who could be working or at least should not qualify for disability. An example is my next door neighbor. He’s a genuine asshole about 60 years old. He’ been on disability or assistance for well over 30 years now. He mostly sits around his house and goes out buy guns, fishing boats, beer and other stuff. He sued one neighbor when a storm took down a tree that damaged about a 5′ foot section of a rotted wood fence and got $2400. He has attempted to sue another for causing him undue stress and discomfort that was thrown out of court. He got injured cutting down a tree for some old guy and is trying to sue him. He’s not cut his yard in three years. He’s reported me to the River Authority three times all for bullshit and so many times on others that everyone knows all the River Authority guys on a first name basis. He’s on easy street. And citizens like you pay tax to support this prick so he can live in a beautiful location right on the fucking lake. On the other hand there are folks around, many who were in the trades that have handicaps or are otherwise pretty much fucked up. They don’t have the mental dexterity to do something other than what took them most of their lives to learn to do in a half ass acceptable fashion. They have worked long and hard hard and paid taxes to enrich the man. I don’t begrudge them getting assistance. And yes the corporate / banker criminals that appear to really run the country take in a big hunk of FSA type cash. But the elite for the most part are no more demented, criminal, evil, shiftless or brilliant than the rest of the herd. What distinguishes them is that they have benefited by circumstance, birthright, or serendipitous associations. The elite behave and do exactly what most all of the 99% would do if they traded places. The fish is rotten from head to tail. The thing to be concerned with is that most of everyone from the bottom to top are idiots, imbeciles, morons, dysfunctional wackos, delusional psychos, freeloading manics or criminals who are all in gauged in a mass clusterfuck that has no hope for a good outcome. And that is why we are doomed. Priorities? Yeah, Priority One: get prepared, get ready. With such an overwhelming potential for a Financial Armageddon, a Pandemic of War and Violence, a Supply Line Apocalypse or a Social Meltdown to carry on and prepare is about all you can do. Hell, all these things could all happen more or less the same time and Ma Nature could always kick in some awesome natural disaster just to give FEMA a real job to fuck up. Priority Two: Have a pleasant day today, because well………… who knows WTF could happen tomorrow.
But if the FSA, , military and corporate AG and Wall Street welfare breaks the back of the state wealth confiscator who will protect us from the crazed hoards of organic farmers …awww geez…
http://www.libertariannews.org/2012/04/17/pork-lobby-forces-small-pig-farmers-to-shoot-their-baby-piglets/
The US treasury can’t continue to feed, clothe and house poor ,fat stupid people when the our financial nobility desperately need bailing out.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2012/04/19/45786.htm
Secret AIG Deal Reports Face Public Scrutiny
By TRAVIS SANFORD
WASHINGTON (CN) – The government must release reports on all of American International Group’s transactions in the years leading up to its 2004 settlement of securities fraud charges, a federal judge ruled.
“Given the financial meltdown of 2008, the recession it spawned, and the suffering the country has endured because of it, and given the role that AIG played in that financial meltdown,” the public interest in disclosure outweighed arguments from AIG and the SEC to keep such reports secret, U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler wrote.
The Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission filed, and simultaneously settled, securities fraud charges against AIG in November 2004 for $126 million. Though the global re-insurance giant never had to admit or deny the allegations, the consent order required it to retain a government-selected independent consultant and create an audit committee.
The consultant was tasked with analyzing all transactions that AIG entered into between January 1, 2000, and the entry of the 2004 settlement, for misconduct.
Until now, with only two exceptions, access to the consultant’s reports had been limited to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Department of Justice and an AIG audit committee.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/aigs-bailout-is-a-quiet-success/2012/03/08/gIQANC87zR_story.html
The Post’s View
AIG’s bailout is a quiet success
OF ALL THE financial institutions that got government aid during the financial panic of 2008, none was less morally deserving than AIG. The insurance group imploded due to reckless bets it had made through what was essentially an in-house hedge fund. Nor were many bailouts bigger than the $182 billion combined commitment that the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department made to AIG during the Bush and Obama administrations. Yet no bailout was more necessary, given the cascading disaster that AIG’s failure could have set off in the U.S. and European financial systems.
Ron Paul is on CNBC this am for two hours
@sensetti
Thanks for the tip, else I’d never turn on the propaganda box.
At the end of the day, the idea of a free shit army collecting government entitlements is a canard.
It’s meant to pitch people against people. The people most upset are usually middle class complaining about people who, through disability entitlements, bring in 2000 a month or less.
I’ve already complained about the super rich, how about I change my aim to those who make and uphold the criminal and civil laws. The people that made the system the way it is…
politicians, lawyers, judges. All sit on their asses, spout shit from all sides of thier mouths, ‘recognize’ problems, and start, suggest, or sit on committees to brainstorm resolutions to problems they themselves created.
Economy not recoverying fast enough, not enough jobs? Increase unemployment entitlements and lower taxes. Unemployment benefits run out, switch older ‘unemployable’ folks to disability entitlements, or send them to a two year college, lower taxes.
If all else fails, send them to jail for ten bucks worth of crack, marijuanna, or meth. Don’t forget to lower taxes. The ultimate answer to everything that ails the trickle down myth created by those that have…
A great canadian example is politicians being paid $1000 a month to sit on a committee that hasn’t met since 2008…http://www.ipolitics.ca/2012/03/29/alberta-ndp-stands-fast-on-refusal-to-return-cash-for-do-nothing-committee/
If government officials, bankers, ratings agencies and insurance companies can get hundreds of billions of bailouts…
if people making more than a million dollars a year pay less taxes than those that make less than 50 000 per year…
If automakers can get debt forgiveness, bailouts, two tier contracts, and be able to go into and get out of bankrupcy court in 30 days, while workers lose jobs, lose homes, and take years to go through the bankrupcy process…
How does one point the finger so vigorously towards those ‘gettin over’ on the government largess, when that gettin over equals thousands, while perfectly able, smart and connected people get away with millions and billions…
And flash. People are people. Some arejust plain assholes. Rich, poor, smart, ignorant, self rightious, charismatic, able or disabled.
peace…
In reality being morbidly obese is a disability, ( getting a check is another issue ) these people get so fat they can’t breathe, diaphragm ceases to function and lungs shut down.
Obesity hypoventilation syndrome (also known as Pickwickian syndrome) is a condition in which severely overweight people fail to breathe rapidly enough or deeply enough, resulting in low blood oxygen levels and high blood carbon dioxide (CO2) levels. Many people with this condition also frequently stop breathing altogether for short periods of time during sleep (obstructive sleep apnea), resulting in many partial awakenings during the night, which leads to continual sleepiness during the day.[1] The disease puts strain on the heart, which eventually may lead to the symptoms of heart failure, such as leg swelling and various other related symptoms. The most effective treatment is weight loss,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_hypoventilation_syndrome
If government officials, bankers, ratings agencies and insurance companies can get hundreds of billions of bailouts…
if people making more than a million dollars a year pay less taxes than those that make less than 50 000 per year…
If automakers can get debt forgiveness, bailouts, two tier contracts, and be able to go into and get out of bankrupcy court in 30 days, while workers lose jobs, lose homes, and take years to go through the bankrupcy process…
Then how does one point the finger so vigorously towards those ‘gettin over’ on the government largess, when that gettin over equals thousands, while perfectly able, smart and connected people get away with millions and billions…?
Seems like complaining about fly shit in the pepper…
And flash. People are people. Some arejust plain assholes. Rich, poor, smart, ignorant, self rightious, charismatic, able or disabled.
peace…
randy
I scorn the Wall Street slime, Washington maggots and corporate douchebags with equal vigor.
Just because there are rich scum screwing the country doesn’t let the poor scum who are screwing the country off the hook. Fraud is fraud.
The middle class is getting it up the ass from the rich and the poor.
Don’t forget the poor corporate farmer…they need their free shit too.
The nerve of fat, stupid poor folks hogging all that free fiat money.
Subsidy Programs Designed for Agribusinesses[img]https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSE9FDolhEretD1-BY9_A4YliFuzZE7RZesaOYVPy0I2Nql-nO7[/img]
How Farm Subsidies Became America’s Largest Corporate Welfare Program
By Brian Riedl
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2002/02/farm-subsidies-are-americas-largest-corporate-welfare-program
With the House and Senate close to agreeing on a new $171 billion farm bill, the time is right to take a fresh look at farm policy to ensure that taxpayers are getting their money’s worth. Although farm subsidies are justified as helping struggling family farmers make ends meet, the bulk of subsidy payments goes to the largest high-income farms. In fact, current farm policy allocates two out of every three farm subsidy dollars to the top 10 percent of subsidy recipients while completely shutting 60 percent of farmers out of subsidy programs.
The ceilings that are in place on most farm subsidy programs are rarely enforced by Congress or the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and contain loopholes that allow the largest farms and agribusinesses to bypass these limits. As a result, taxpayers are paying billions of dollars to subsidize prosperous farms. Making matters worse, many of the large farms that receive subsidies have used these funds to buy out small farms and consolidate the agriculture industry.
Far from remedying this problem, the House’s Farm Security Act of 2001 (H.R. 2646) and the Senate’s Agriculture Conservation and Rural Enhancement Act (S. 1731) both increase subsidies and continue tilting them to large farms and agribusinesses.1
Subsidy Programs Designed for Agribusinesses[img]https://encrypted-tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSE9FDolhEretD1-BY9_A4YliFuzZE7RZesaOYVPy0I2Nql-nO7[/img]
The middle class is getting it up the ass from the rich and the poor. -admin
We are all boomers now.
I noticed randy didn’t address any of my questions about the timing of the upsurge in claims after I obliterated his Boomer bullshit.
This is common among ideologues. Their argument is blown out of the water so they change course with a new argument.
There are certainly many legitimate SSDI members, but the dramatic surge in applications is clearly driven by fraudulent claims and it is costing American taxpayers billions.
It’s okay, it’s giving disability lawyers jobs.
If one were to accept that your argument is correct, that Clinton’s administrations actions resulted in an upsurge of disability claims, how does one explain that not only did the market rise, GDP rose, as well as employment and profits for large corporations?
In addition, the Clinton administration left office with a federal budget SURPLUS…
It wasn’t that I was being an ideologue by ignoring your argument. It’s just that your argument is shallow and filled with the contradictory evidence of biasedness and closed-mindedness.
If the free shit army started getting all this free shit under Clinton, as well as the repeal of the Glass Steagall act, which enabled record profits in banking, investment banking, real estate, and insurance, which led to a growing economy, and a higher standard of living, AND is so ‘against’ republican or libertarian dogma, then why did Bush continue along this line for eight years?
And if Bush continued with these programs, and added a tax cut for the rich, and two wars, exacty which party, or president, is responsible for this mess, and which party or candadite can clean it up?
As long as people continue to point out pennies, the system, and the rich are stealing biliions…
In the long run, people that are receiving entitlements, whether deserved or not, will not rock the boat. Which allows the powers that be to do anything they want.
peace anyway…
randy
Everyone wants free shit, except it isn’t free. If you are so shallow and weak minded enough to consider $120 billion per year in SSDI spending as pennies then you should be working in the Obama administration.
In the long run entitlements will destroy the country. You must not have kids since you don’t think a $100 trillion unfunded entitlement liability is a problem.
Peace my ass.
To sumerize the above: if rising disability claims were not a problem then, than why are they a problem now?
Especially considering the original material of the post postulates that age has very little to do with the rise in claims…
So you really believe that the tipping point is deadbeat disability claimants (welfare recipients, extended unemployment beneifts, food stamps, student loan deadbeats etc) as opposed to corporate welfare, farm subsidies,tax havens and loopholes for the rich and porkbarrelism?
it’s a hypothetical, no need to answer…
peace…
So now the argument is the entire SSDI spending and all entitlement spending as opposed to the those gaming the system…
When you consider 10 trillion split up by 300 million and the 14 trillion or so, split up by rich bankers, and insurance companies, which would you consider a bigger threat?
Just to be clear, is it the entitlements to main street, or the entitlements to Wall Street (700 BILLION +++), the entitlement to political salaries and pensions, or the entitlements of tax havens, subsidies to oil, agri, solar etc.?
Considering that your argument has gotten both more general (entire entitlement spending) and more pointed (regular people as opposed to the rich or connected), i’m not expecting an answer to the above hypotheticals…
peace…
Randy again didn’t answer my questions.
DO YOU HAVE KIDS? Pretty simple question.
The answer is surely no because you don’t give a shit about future generations as long as you get yours. Right randy?
Randy
I notice you confused $10 trillion with $100 trillion. I guess the difference of $90 trillion is just a minor issue for you.
Do you even understand what an unfunded liability is?
I bet you don’t. Ideologues trying to sell a storyline aren’t concerned with facts or $90 trillion errors.
BTW, thankyou for addressing the issues I’ve brought up as opposed to regurjitating your argument, the same way, over and over.
Randy philosophy of the world:
The bankers have stolen hundreds of billions so it is OK for everyone else to game the system for their billions.
Thank you for providing the worldview that will bring about the downfall of this country.
It amazes me how narrow minded even supposedly intelligent people can be. They are incapable or unwilling to realize that bad behavior and lack of personal responsibility is not limited to one class of people.
Randy is just fine with the Free Shit Army defrauding the American taxpayer. I think its time you head back over to Paul Krugman’s blog where your worldview is in vogue.