Jack Cafferty Calls Social Security a 'Social Welfare Program'
You know, I used to have some respect for Jack Cafferty even though I knew back then that we were on primarily opposite ends of the political spectrum because he spoke out against the Bush administration when that wasn't necessarily the most popular thing for a conservative to be doing, but he just lost me completely here. Calling Social Security a "welfare program" is just shameless.
The widows and orphans who receive those benefits do so after a spouse or a parent paid into the system and seniors receive the benefit after paying into it for their entire lives. And unemployment insurance is just that, insurance. It's not welfare. And does Jack really think we should just leave our elderly, the disabled and young mothers and children with no help to pay their medical bills at all? What cost does he think it would be to our society to just leave those people to rot on the streets?
Painting people who receive these benefits as "welfare" recipients paints a picture of a bunch of lazy unemployed people who don't want to work, and just want to sit on their duffs and collect government benefits. Does he think that most of the people receiving these benefits now haven't worked for a living most of their lives and paid into the system? At a time when we've got record unemployment and underemployment and a lot of good, decent, hard working Americans who would like to find jobs and can't, asking a question with this frame is doing nothing but trying to pit one middle or lower class individual in the United States against another and get them to resent each other. It's divide and conquer bulls**t to distract from us from those who have caused our economic problems and they are NOT the elderly, the poor, the unemployed, widows, orphans and young mothers and their children who don't have any health insurance. Shame on you Jack.
Here's his post at The Cafferty File. Thankfully a lot of the answers if you go read his entire comments section were a whole lot better than his question, but sadly a lot of the comments there were from individuals who've bought into the kind of resentment that Cafferty is peddling here.
What does it mean if social welfare benefits make up 1/3 of wages, salaries in U.S.?:
Americans have become alarmingly dependent on handouts from Uncle Sam, according to a new report.
Government social welfare programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and unemployment insurance made up 35% of all public and private wages and salaries last year. That's more than one-third of all the money Americans earned.
These findings are contained in a study of government data done by TrimTabs Investment Research. In 2000, 21% of all wages and salaries in the United States came from social welfare programs. In 1960, it was just 10%.
One of the economists at TrimTabs says we're in for some difficult times ahead unless this country can get back to at least the 26% ratio it had before the recession started. And she says there are only two ways to do that: Either increase private sector wages and salaries by 35% or cut social welfare benefits by nearly a quarter. Neither of those things is likely to happen.
Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the so-called entitlement programs, make up more than 60% of federal spending each year. As the baby boomers get older, retire and need more medical care, the costs for those programs will only go up.
While the squabbling over budget cuts continues on Capitol Hill, you can be sure no one is touching these programs. The $60 billion measure passed by the House last month didn't touch one dime of those three programs.
As the evidence continues to mount that our country is hurtling toward an economic disaster, our government refuses to respond in any meaningful way.
Here’s my question to you: What does it mean if social welfare benefits make up more than 1/3 of all wages and salaries paid in the U.S.?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Mike in Brooklyn:
It means that we're in a bad Recession. One so bad that it's really a Depression. What is shocking to me about how you phrase your question, Jack, is that you fail to include all the handouts to businesses (especially the large corporations), trade associations, and "development" commissions, among other entities, that get subsidies.Sylvia in San Diego:
It means that we are a welfare nation and in order to recover from this economic disaster, it will be very painful for many.Larry in Springfield, Ohio:
Jack, it means that those jobs that Americans refuse to do need to be done by Americans that refuse to do them. If they are able otherwise, we need to stop paying people not to work.A.:
Welcome to reality. The middle class used to make money and pay taxes. Now the rich make the money and don't pay taxes; the poor don't make money and receive poverty credits to keep them from attacking the system with pitchforks.Patsy:
Jack, I'm certainly no authority but how can Social Security be classified as a "handout" when people who draw on it are the same people who used some of their salary to pay into it? It is money earned but saved. The Government should never have borrowed on it in the first place, and technically were not supposed to. If left alone to earn interest, most likely there would be more money now.Nancy in Tennessee:
The answer does lie in increasing wages and salaries in the private sector by 35%. It all boils down to jobs. This country needs more jobs that will provide a living wage. Americans are hurting individually and that translates into a hurting American economy.Rick:
It means that we are a socialist country, whether we like it or not. And while people may not like the label, just try taking away all that income!Bob:
It means I'm in the wrong job!
conquer" is called "divide and rule." Means the same, but the Euro version is clearer, I think. This is the second person who I thought I could trust to be accurate who repeated this lie publicly. First Maher, who did not mention his error on his latest show, and now Cafferty. Interesting.
to wonder how we compare to the
European industrialized countries that have universal healthcare and guaranteed pensions.
...for a little less talk and a lot more action...we're in the actual fight of all our lives against opponents who are psychopathics.We seem to be in this fight, looking for mercy, from a deranged, heartless, enemy.They only think of themselves,everyone else, commodities.Discardable.GARBAGE!!! One question,do YOU show "mercy", to everyday trash ? I think,(yes think,not feel),this is a great comparison.How about it people.
"Blind faith, in anything, guides the mindless"-Le Mien,
Hey Jack we payed into that program. That money belongs to the people not the government. Jack is no longer a journalist. Jack is now and forever a fool.
To quote the wonderful Louis CK:
"You didn't pay for a movie, you paid for a ticket."
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
I don't want to hear any of this "welfare" crap. Every paycheck has a deduction for social security.
I want my money back.
If it's welfare then can I get a refund on all the money I've paid into it?
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
Yo Jack, get back to work ....I'm on welfare (SSA) xD
Seems like all we here is hand outs well lets talk about banks get big handouts, wallstreet gets special handouts, billonares and millonares get special hand outs on taxes and taxes when you die.Big business get special handouts low if any paid taxes, so when it comes to getting hand outs they get billons, how about wallstreet and bank bounes the american only get the scraps, and they have the nerve to cry. Poor jack finally got brain washed working working for communist news networth, o I ment cnn.
Those people are rich and they worked really really hard for their hand out.
Beer-i.e., God's Sweet Nectar- is a magic drink that makes you smarter, stronger, and more sexy.
-S. Colbert
Jack Cafferty needs to take the catheter from his
butt to his brain out now, the dark is too intense for him.
Rich over privaledged aristcrats, calling people who actually really worked all their life lazy.
And what does a hard day at work look like to these SOB's?
Get to the office where they have a private secretary to kiss their ass and get them extra holindaise sauce for their eggs benedict.
Drink coffee and feel self important until lunchtime.
Go out for lobster bisque and a small filet for lunch, then come back to the office, or go to a political event where someone kisses their a** until dinner time, when they have Alaskan King crab for dinner and baked Alaska for desert.
All free of course, with unlimited cocktails included.
After this brutal day at the "office," they are paid $$$$$$$$ to go on the air for 60 seconds and tell the rest of us how lazy we are, and that we have it too damn good.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
that they work up a heavy sweat in the hour they spend at the gym.
wel·fare noun \ˈwel-ˌfer\
1. the state of doing well especially in respect to good fortune, happiness, well-being, or prosperity
2. aid in the form of money or necessities for those in need, an agency or program through which such aid is distributed
So doing well, or helping those less fortunate. That is now being framed as a bad thing in this, the most Christian and pious nation in the world?
I am having a tough time deciding who the American power establishment is trying to piss off more in their graves: Orwell or Jesus.
CTHULHU 2012 "Why vote for a lesser evil?"
"So doing well, or helping those less fortunate is a bad thing now for this the most Christian and pious of countries? "
have you ever tried to get help from the large churches/faiths in this country?
they will kick you out of their property. the pastor/asshole who runs
their businesses pays more for his suits than most give to charity or to
help their own poor membership. total hypocrites.
they would kick jesus out of their churches.
Jeebus is not in a grave....remember?
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
Stop calling it welfare, Jack. Go ask the top 2% why they don't pay taxes, but the rest of us have to pay for their wall street casino. Huh?
Hey guess where that appears? "Social Welfare" is exactly what Social Security is for, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. The fact that it almost pays its own way is just gravy.
pay for itself.
Keep speaking the truth. There is a sickness in the land, and if we keep silent, it will just keep spreading.
do not drink that Kool Aid. Now why were the military expenditures not mentioned, not even in the viewer's comments segment?
Jack never heard of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. It says we pay and you can not take it away from us. It says that money is ours for a specific purpose. Taking this money from us is theft Jack!
Old man should just shut up about social secutiry - it's a foil - red herring - a diversion. Stay focused on the issue - trillions of dollars wasted, stolen, missing, and trillions of spending on oil subsidies, senseless wars, senseless military spending, criminal bankers running free and stealing more money, cut throat health insurance plans, and ridiculous tax breaks for millionaires.
Fore Shame, CNN. For Shame, Old Man.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
I worked hard for my measly monthly social security check, without which I'd be destitute real soon.
People who have it way too good have no idea what real life looks like.
NONE of them should be in positions of power or influence.
f'n useless eaters all of them
When will government of the people, by the politicians, for the corporations perish from this Earth?
Not soon enough!
You leave my money alone "Jack". Keep your paws off it!
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Could it be he needs a job at Faux news? He now appears qualified.
Jesus a quote with an organization affiliated with the financial institutions. What does one expect.
Charlie
how blatant the lies are becoming. Almost every phrase he used in the set up to his 'question' was skewed to a biased point of view - namely that people who are on Social Security are all lazy SOB's who should be out sweeping streets or mining coal to 'earn' their Gov't handout; even if they're 60 or older.!
I did earn my Soc Sec by working for 33 years, and I'd still be working if the company I worked for during the last 20 years hadn't eliminated my job and those of all the managers, and then outsourced the management of our subsidiary. I'm not sure how old Jack is, but I'd sure like to see the Old Goat try to do manual labor at his age or even get hired for any job.
I'm certain he and all of his compatriots will Refuse to Accept their Social Security when they 'retire' so the widows and orphans will be able to buy more cat food. Despicable!
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
When the bottom earning half of the population pays for benefits that are given out to the top earning half of the population, it's welfare for the well-to-do. Social Security should be means tested. If payments go all the way to the top, then the ERISA tax should go all the way to the top, without a cutoff. The GOP refuses to admit this into their skewed "discussion" and reporters avoid the subject because some reporters and most bosses make above the cutoff line.
BTW--Google Steven King's recent comments on taxation. Old man, I apologize for everything I said about you when I was 12. You do, indeed, rock.
Social Security is not a fucking social welfare program. Damnit!
Jack Cafferty's biggest concern is whether the pharmacy is out of his favorite hemorrhoidal cream.
'Talk to the hand'
What a twat. I get subsidized for rent and healthcare. If that's going to be taken away i'm fucked hard. Glad i'm not in your country Jack shit. I just got a better rental house today, going to sign the papers next week, it's twice the rent i pay now but i can afford it because i get help from the government.
Bastards like you makes people to life in cardboard boxes.
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
Handout?
HANDOUT?
Jack, do you mean the "handout" I'm now receiving from the account I paid into for the 35 years I worked?
And do you mean the "handout" I'm now receiving after I waited 10 years to start getting my checks?
Is that the "handout" you mean?
Jack, if it weren't for the fact that I have respect for all dead sperm, I'd call you a dickwad.
Jack is just another pathetic part of a Corrupt organization that has seen its viewership plunge downward.
Newsweek magazine was in the same position that CNN. finds its self in a race to the bottom with its
competitor FOX. Newsweek was finally sold and decided to make the magazine more factual and less
opinion oriented. Good for them! Let's hope this kind of thinking catches on.
http://www.newsweek.com/2011/03/06/social-sec...
"We don’t call Social Security “welfare” because it’s a pejorative term and politicians don’t want to offend. So they classify Social Security as something else, when it isn’t. Here’s how I define a welfare program: first, it taxes one group to support another group, meaning it’s pay-as-you-go and not a contributory scheme where people’s own savings pay their later benefits; and second, Congress can constantly alter benefits, reflecting changing needs, economic conditions, and politics. Social Security qualifies on both counts..."
Jack Cafferty is a grumpy old piece of shit.
fiber.
Some of you already know that I'm an alumni of the orphan benefits (half-orphan, got benefits from 12 to 18 years old) and now I'm an "adult disabled child."
Frankly, I would gladly take a cut in my SS benefits if I were allowed work part-time with my handmade accessories as a business, and if they would agree NOT to take away my medicare. Entreprenuership is great for PWDs, especially those whose disabilities date back to childhood (like mine) and who don't have a normal work track record and resume like most people do. Alas though, if I started a small-buisness I would lose my Medicare and I would be destroyed if that happened. I did my research and discovered I'm basically being pushed into not working.
Anyway, Grumpy here can keep his mitts off my SSDI. My paternal unit made many parenting mistakes and mistakes in general, but the one thing he could do well, which was work hard as a mule, even when he was drunk, is still helping me nearly 17 years after his death thanks to the taxes he paid into SS for decades. Fuck you Cafferty!
"The greatest tyranny is censoring information in order to be better able to control people." - Cristina Saralegui
Get him off the SAUCE!
programs to him and then told him that ignorantly spewing blatant lies to his audience was no way to get ratings.
What. An. Idiot.
“The greatest evildoers are those who don’t remember because they have never given thought to the matter, and, without remembrance, nothing can hold them back,”
Don't watch it anymore after seeing "journalist" Breitbart being "interviewed" by Piers Morgan.
30 seconds was all I could take.
Jack's just following the corporate line at the Corporate Not News station.
Chicken Noodle News
Chicken#$@^% Noodle News.
And very, very, very boooooring!!!!!!
a short education on Social Security...simple so you can understand:
1. Social Security didn’t create the deficit.
2. Social Security benefits are earned; reducing them amounts to confiscation.
3. Social Security is funded until 2037.
4. The trust fund is invested in bonds, the most secure investment in the world. To suggest that the trust fund wouldn’t pay is blatant fear-mongering.
5. Social Security is an easy fix.
There...try to keep up.
“The greatest evildoers are those who don’t remember because they have never given thought to the matter, and, without remembrance, nothing can hold them back,”
I can't remember the last time I heard that crotchety old fart knocker Jack. So he just stepped out of his crypt for this? Cork it you old putz.
If SS is welfare, then what the fuck do you call it when the banksters and the criminals get OUR tax money from the bailout? Are you auditioning for Fox?
NOBODY 2012
I don't care what you call it or how you describe it , SSI is good for society , is a good program , is the least this country can provide it's citizens and we pay for it , it ain't free , so friggin what if it was ? Wouldn't that be just terrible ? All the better ! Welfare for the people is evil , is bad , but welfare for the wealthiest and for the corporations ? Not a problem , that's justifiable and we can afford it . Call it welfare , I don't care , look up the primary definition of word welfare , it's a good thing .
"The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."
Welfare is good. Don't let anyone say otherwise without challenging them.
If you want examples of people taking without earning, don't look to welfare, look to Wall Street.
You just lost a fan.
After working 50 years and paying into the system,
I consider that insurance NOT WELFARE!
I'm 53 yrs. old & did more manual labor today than this "journalist" piece of shit has done in the last 5 yrs. Bite me Jack(ass). This is a large piece of the reason my remote forgot how to find CNN.
It's not all or nothing.
I've done both manual and mental labor throughout my life.
Both are necessary. Nobody should be ashamed of doing either.
So Mr. Cafferty says that Social Security is "welfare".
What's wrong with welfare?
Wasn't our country founded to "Promote the General Welfare"?
To all the critics, I would just say:
Goodbye is too good a word, babe,
So I'll just say "Fare thee well."
that those are social welfare programs. Heather, when did you forget the definition of the word welfare? Heather, when you want to argue with someone using a word within the legitimate definition of the word, you become a cartoon.
It was OK to bail out Wall Street and its billionaire CEOs and millionaire veeps, but NOT OK for elderly widows to collect benefits they and their late husbands PAID INTO and which are keeping them housed and fed in dignity NOT luxury? I used to have respect for Cafferty, but no more. Cafferty has no soul after all.
the welfare of our citizens should be important.....while we pay into the systems, i fear we take more out.....some changes are necessary, just not the draconian steps some want to take....
for instance means testing at a level or higher deductible based on wealth (not just income)....while some would argue not fair, at least we are doing something to help the situation....anyone who understands the health cost trajectory probably can't sleep at night
Whether you call Social Security welfare or entitlements, as always the Corporate Monopoly Media treats Americans like idiots. It's time to evolve out of a primitive representative republic and into a real Citizen's Democracy with real time Internet based democratic Controls.
Call social security what you like, go ahead and keep denying the fact it is going to be insolvent by 2016 as all the long term fiscal challenge GAO US financial reports confirm it is. In the next 5 years the sh*t is going to hit the fan because it has been robbed by our politicians and spent on other stuff.
A better question than what are we going to do to protect social security is where are we going to find enough income to reverse the course of insolvency? You think you can tax the rich enough to make that happen? Good luck with that.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
yes. Slightly increase the tax budren of the wealthy, eliminate corporate subsidies, and close corporate tax loopholes and that should do it. By the way, all those folks will end up just fine!
... but it sure seems like somebody took offense at something that was not meant to be offensive. Social Security is a program to promote the welfare of those who stand in need of having their general welfare promoted.
Get a grip.
VERY WRONG!
Get a grip, yourself.
Social Security and Medicare are insurance programs not welfare programs. Sounds like Mr. Cafferty needs to check out some history. I assume that since he earns too much for welfare that he has not accepted his Social Security benefits and is not participating in the Medicare program if and when he is eligible by physical age and not his demonstrated mental age. .
He must be on the sauce again!!! He hasn't much time left at the network, and he's doing all he can to put himself in good stead with the company.
You know those yearly social security breakdowns we all get every year . .
I'm 57, mine stated that I had contributed $93,000 and my employers had contributed $93,777(?) into my social security fund, thus far . .
How is social security welfare? If I retire at 70, I'll never live long enough to collect my contributions into social security, receiving the maximun amount given by SS, which I believe is about $2,100.(?)
I don't know how old Cafferty is, but he looks old enough to be on Social Security, or maybe he is financially secure enough that he refused to apply for it. That is choice. It is also the choice for those who qualify to receive SS.
Does he tell his parents that they should not accept their "welfare" checks? If they are no longer with him, when they were, surely one or both of them received a monthly SS check. I doubt if the receiver sent the checks back with a note that stated: I am returning this check. Please do not send any more of these welfare checks.
dorothycharlesbanks
It seems that all the programs the GOP is working so hard to eliminate across the board are the ones that affluent Americans don't have to depend on. How Christian of them.
Everyone in the media is friggin rich and don't care about us. It's us against them. Turn off your tv and put them out of work.
you are getting hung up on a single word. Welfare does not mean charity.
–noun
1.
the good fortune, health, happiness, prosperity, etc., of a person, group, or organization; well-being: to look after a child's welfare; the physical or moral welfare of society.
2.
welfare work.
3.
financial or other assistance to an individual or family from a city, state, or national government: Thousands of jobless people in this city would starve if it weren't for welfare.
4.
( initial capital letter ) Informal . a governmental agency that provides funds and aid to people in need, especially those unable to work.
—Idiom
5.
on welfare, receiving financial aid from the government or from a private organization because of hardship and need.
I am just saying,
I guess Cafferty wants to go back to the time in history (most of history) when the masses were so poor they begged on the street and ate out of trash cans. Is that what these right-wingers really want?
The orphans and the widows, the old and the disabled, etc., where does he want them to work?
-- at the Dollar Store?
The pro life people want to stop abortions and that will create even more hungry mouths they won't pay to feed. Maybe they want these people to work as low-pay domestics for them, cleaning rich peoples' toilets for a piece of bread.
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