Summary

Despite Donald Trump’s promise to avoid Social Security cuts, recent signals from the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, suggest reductions may be forthcoming.

The department, aimed at streamlining federal spending, has sparked concern among advocates worried about potential impacts on the program.

Trump’s mixed messaging and DOGE’s focus on cost-cutting have intensified scrutiny as officials prepare policy recommendations.

      • Sanctus@lemmy.world
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        5 days ago

        I wonder if we can sue them for taking this from us. I mean, I been paying into that for twelve fucken years. A lot of others have put a lot more in.

    • DogPeePoo@lemm.ee
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      5 days ago

      Two wealthy billionaire immigrants hired to pilfer American livelihood because the Government borrowed and bet from our Social Security— and lost the money. Now they see no other way out of insolvency.

      Certainly Elon and Vivek aren’t going to start paying their fair share of taxes, so it’s steal from the poor and give to the rich.

  • GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    It gets so tiring to hear over and over and over again that the only way to solve the budget problems is through austerity. You know there is another side that can help with reducing a deficit called taxes? Specifically taxing billionaires. But it seems that only the poor must suffer when making things more efficient.

    • Jumpingspiderman@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Taxing billionaires makes sense and would work well to solve all sorts of problems. But the billionaires own the government and the politicians.

      • futatorius@lemm.ee
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        4 days ago

        That can change. And as an emergency measure, we should asset-strip every single one of them.

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      I love the idea of the “austerity” of billionaires being cut down to size and having to live on “only” $999 million as Bernie proposed - tax anything over that at 100%.

  • Pyrin@kbin.melroy.org
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    5 days ago

    To all old voters who wanted Trump: HA!! HA!! HA!!

    Enjoy your sentencing from this clown.

    • Xanthobilly@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      It won’t hit the elderly, they’ll cut based on current age. It’s anyone under 40 that’ll be fucked.

      • MrVilliam@lemm.ee
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        5 days ago

        Oh good, that’s me. 9/11 in middle school, wars through high school, '08 housing crash in the middle of college which pushed me to pivot to an AA instead of bachelor’s, COVID wedding at 31, insane inflation through now. We finally bought our first house a few months ago and I turned 36 a few days ago. Things were starting to seem like they might turn out okay after all. Serves me right for having a whisper of optimism in my brain for once.

        Pensions in this country are nearly non-existent. Without social security either, only the wealthy can retire. Thankfully, I’ve had retirement accounts for years, but they’ll be wiped out by the first late life medical emergency I experience. Without social security to look forward to, I think a lot of people would rather live through total societal collapse than give their everything just to prop up this system that gives nothing back. It’s a bad fucking deal.

        • MagicShel@lemmy.zip
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          4 days ago

          My retirement accounts just got wiped by 5 months out of work. I’m over fifty and starting that shit over. I’m very lucky in that my father in law will supposedly leave us around a million dollars when he dies, but that’s a morbid and fragile situation. If, deity forbid, we got a divorce, I’m guaranteed to have to work until I keel over. Also if he experiences long term hospitalization, that’ll eat that up super quick.

          Even if we get full social security, that’ll drop our income by something like 80% and our house isn’t going to be paid off until we’re close to 80.

          My wife is blissfully ignorant and considers our retirement to be “taken care of.” I hope, babe, because kibble is going to be hard to chew once we can’t afford dental care…

        • Tech With Jake@lemm.ee
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          4 days ago

          When the fuck did I write this?

          But seriously, we’re boned. Doing everything I can to give my family a good life and have cushion for the future. You’re 100% correct though, almost don’t care if society collapses at this point.

      • Wiz@midwest.social
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        5 days ago

        I’m mid-50s, and expect my share that I’ve been counting on for more than 3 decades of work to be disappeared. Pull the rug out at the last minute.

        I’m Gen-X and have been screwed by Boomers (and younger deplorable “Gen-X Boomers”) my whole life. T***p was one final fuck-you to my generation. The Gen-X morons don’t yet realize their own self-goal.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          5 days ago

          Agreed. I’ve watched donvict nearly my entire life. I remember this asshat back in the 80s and thought he was a scumbag dipshit back then. The idea that any people my age - Gen X - and younger voted for that POS sickens me.

          I think I now realize how boomers that were in the know about Ronnie Raygun watching that dipshit get two terms felt. Whole lotta dumbfucks voted for that asshole, too. Only historians will be able to tell which one did longer term damage. We have donvict only because of the dumpster fire that Ronnie Raygun started…

  • Ænima@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    Go ahead, ya swarmy fucks. You think a CEO denying healthcare is the last high profile death, take the last of everything, from those who have so little, and no bunker or hired goons will save you. Mark my words, when backed against a wall, they will lose. History has proven that over and over again.

  • TimeSquirrel@kbin.melroy.org
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    5 days ago

    Go ahead. Fuck with people’s money, or expectations of money. See how far that gets you. Culture wars are one thing, and don’t affect everyone, but cold hard cash is very real to most people. I fucking dare them.

  • L0rdMathias@sh.itjust.works
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    5 days ago

    Wait, is he using his kid as a human shield now? Not one time has he been holding a child now suddenly it’s part of his wardrobe. Lmfao.

    • Pistcow@lemm.ee
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      Oh, I’m trying to find the video of the cartoon where the bad guy is using a hostage as a shield and he’s perfectly moving them around to track the good guys gun. Was it Venture Brothers?

  • riodoro1@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    You fuckers got Musk as a politician now.

    He’s even posing for pictures with his kid. The only one dumb enough still to not fucking hate him.

    America is a meme state at this point

    • Laser@feddit.org
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      He’s even posing for pictures with his kid. The only one dumb enough still to not fucking hate him.

      Oh, the child has nothing to do with posing, he’s just afraid for his life since the UHC CEO got shot and hopes having a child around is a detriment

    • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Like anyone will even care about what’s happening to them?

      Just look at recent surveys, where economic sentiment is basically political opinion now, not how people are actually fairing: https://www.axios.com/2024/12/06/trump-economy-democrats-republicans-inflation

      The metric was not like that before.

      But we are in an era where influencers, feeds and whims trump reality and fact. I thought COVID-19 proved that, but it’s pretty much irrefutable now, and people (on average) are going to care less about what’s physically taken away than how some angry influencer makes them feel about it.

      • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        Oh, and one other comment is this - Democrats tend to understand how tariffs work. They also probably have some inkling about what would happen to the economy under mass deportations and the related state terrorism that would entail…

        Qons, on the other hand, are told ridiculous fairy tales about the price of eggs, and believe them.

      • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        My sentiment is that all the economic indicators were quite good under Biden, even with inflation - esp. as contrasted with other nations. Not perfect, but likely worse under donvict. Now that we are even getting inflation under control, the qons will act like they really had a “landslide” victory and do all kinds of stupid things to fuck it all up. Including tariffs, apparently.

        Right now, the stocks went through what looks like a sugar high type of scenario due to donvict’s win and what some people think he’ll do for them (tax cuts and no federal oversight?). Not sure that will last.

        But if donvict does the kinds of tariffs he is talking about - it’s anyone’s guess just what that will result in. Never mind some of the other chaos and destruction he and the parasitic class will do…

  • nifty@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    They can do it and get sued, the fact is people who paid into it expecting to make use of the program were stolen from if they cut it. The govt. needs to stop being a bitch and tax the wealthy.

    • oyo@lemm.ee
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      Yup, it’s such a lie that SS and Medicare are socialist “entitlements.” We’re entitled to them because we fucking paid for them.

      • futatorius@lemm.ee
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        4 days ago

        The first government pension system was implemented by that arch-conservative Bismarck.

    • AdolfSchmitler@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      Imminent domain and civil asset forfeiture are the government stealing your shit and telling you to get fucked. You think it won’t be the same for social security?

    • Etterra@discuss.online
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      4 days ago

      Good luck with that under the Orange Idiotn and his shit chugging sycophants. As a disabled person who needs SSDI to live, I’d join that lawsuit in a nanosecond.

  • kreskin@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    So they charge us for social securityin our paychecks for our entire lives, just to take our money away before we can retire, and just keep what they took.

    • COASTER1921@lemmy.ml
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      The writing has been on the wall for a while now. All retirement planning I’ve done is based on the assumption that SSA won’t be around by the time I retire. The fact that we can’t even remove the taxable maximum to retain some degree of financial solvency is proof enough.

      I think the most likely course of action is that we will get some portion of our contributions back, but not the full amount. I just hope that they don’t raise the retirement age so much to try to retain the illusion of being able to get a full payout. I’d rather get a fraction of my contributions back at 67 than need to risk living to a much older age but receiving full benefits.

  • prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    4 days ago

    I just hope they do it fast enough for my parents to feel the acute effects… I don’t know any other way to possibly snap them out of this.