You should just stick with propagandizing in fact free venues.
Prior to Reagan, SS existed on a pay-go basis with a small trust fund as a buffer. There was no money to disappear into the general fund.
http://www.demos.org/data-byte/social-security-trust-fund-balance
Al Gore was a junior Congressman from Tennessee at the time. I doubt he was consulted.
SS taxes were raised considerably at the time to build up the trust fund as it exists today.
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/content/pdf/ssrate_historical.pdf
Reagan on the subject at the time-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-91W5LS0E8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCDjqy5_V2w
See the guy to his left? Alan Greenspan.
Mere facts. Inconvenient from your propagandizing POV, but facts nonetheless.
I'm torn between asking if you even read the shit you post or if you even can read the shit you post. You are without doubt the most stupid person on these boards and may in fact be the most stupid person on the planet. Sheesh!
You assert that prior to Reagan setting up the trust fund in '87, Social Security/Medicaid was pay as you go, then offer as proof a graph from demos.org of the value of the freakin' trust fund SINCE IT WAS MOVED OFF-BUDGET. Then you post another link showing the historic rates as proof of Reagan's perfidy in raising SS taxes "considerably" to build up the trust fund. By your link, Reagan raised the rate a whopping 1.72% actual (1988 rates minus 1981 rates) for a 12.9% increase in the rate over eight years. Carter raised the rate 1.6% actual (1977 rates minus 1980 rates) for a 13.7% increase in the rate over FOUR years. Under Reagan, the cap went from $29,700 to $45,000, an increase of 51.5% over eight years. Under Carter, the cap went from $16,500 to $25,900, an increase of 57.0% over FOUR years. The reason the rates were raised under both Presidents is because the fund was going broke. Yes, the Social Security fund increased massively in Reagan's time in office, because the damned economy was booming.
For those not wishing to be as stupid as Jhhnn - which, granted, technically may not even be humanly possible but is still a fate to be avoided - let me point out that the reforms passed under Reagan (by a Democrat-controlled Congress with bipartisan support) were ACCOUNTING reforms designed to make it more politically damaging to spend excess Social Security money on other things. It's also worth pointing out that it was Johnson who administratively moved Social Security into the general fund, and that the Democrat-controlled Congress in 1990 largely undid the Reagan-era changes. (Although full disclosure, that might not be fully fair to Johnson as in theory there is no practical, fundamental difference in carrying Social Security on-budget or off-budget; the trust fund is calculated, tracked and operated exactly the same. The only change is whether it is the general fund as a line item, tracked like any other federal program and self-funded, or in a separate account. This is a procedural change, not an operational change.)
Social Security has always had a trust fund, period, all the way back to 1939. It has to, as prior to Reagan taking office the previous six years (and 1981, and in fact four years prior) the trust fund was paying out more than it took in despite the increases in cap and rates. Here is the SSA's own historical trust fund value table.
http://www.ssa.gov/history/tftable.html
Note that in years 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980, and 1981 the Social Security trust fund decreased, from $45,886 million in 1974 to $24,539 million in 1981. We tend to think of the Social Security crisis in terms of baby boomers retiring without remembering that economic and structural factors have caused problems in the past.
Again, Reagan's move was an accounting change. Excess Social Security receipts have always been used to purchase government bonds because the alternatives, such as investing excess Social Security receipts in a non-government vehicle or buying up hard currency, are impractical and/or politically contentious. What changed under Reagan was how the trust fund was treated in accounting, specifically in the budget process. It was a move designed to make it politically more difficult to spend excess Social Security receipts, just as the Johnson era change was to make it politically less difficult to spend excess Social Security receipts. However, neither Johnson administratively nor Reagan through Congress changed the Social Security trust fund conceptually or operationally; it has always existed because that's the only way to cover shortfalls both immediate and long term. Yes, under Reagan the rates and caps were raised, as they were under Carter, Ford, Nixon, all the way back to Eisenhower, because actuarially the increases were necessary to meet promised payments.
Let me stress one more time that these are changes in accounting; whether the federal government directly spends excess Social Security receipts from the general fund or borrows them from the Social Security, the Social Security trust fund operates exactly the same. It purchases government bonds with excess receipts, and cashes those government bonds if receipts fall short of obligations. The ONLY change is the accounting procedure used to move the money from the Social Security Administration to the general fund.
Some other links for people who do not wish to be as stupid as Jhhnn.
Snopes on Social Security changes.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/socialsecurity/changes.asp
Reagan's 1981 letter to Congress on the matter. (The earlier SSA link showed the negative receipts of the 70s to give some context.)
http://www.ssa.gov/history/reaganstmts.html
The SSA's own page on Social Security myths.
http://www.ssa.gov/history/InternetMyths2.html
This gives some very illustrative guidance here. Bolding is mine.
Q1. Which political party took Social Security from the independent trust fund and put it into the general fund so that Congress could spend it?
A1: There has never been any change in the way the Social Security program is financed or the way that Social Security payroll taxes are used by the federal government. The Social Security Trust Fund was created in 1939 as part of the Amendments enacted in that year. From its inception, the Trust Fund has always worked the same way. The Social Security Trust Fund has never been "put into the general fund of the government."
Most likely this question comes from a confusion between the financing of the Social Security program and the way the Social Security Trust Fund is treated in federal budget accounting. Starting in 1969 (due to action by the Johnson Administration in 1968) the transactions to the Trust Fund were included in what is known as the "unified budget." This means that every function of the federal government is included in a single budget. This is sometimes described by saying that the Social Security Trust Funds are "on-budget." This budget treatment of the Social Security Trust Fund continued until 1990 when the Trust Funds were again taken "off-budget." This means only that they are shown as a separate account in the federal budget. But whether the Trust Funds are "on-budget" or "off-budget" is primarily a question of accounting practices--it has no effect on the actual operations of the Trust Fund itself.
Note that even while Social Security is in the general fund in the sense of being in the same budget, it is still for all intents and purposes a separate program with its receipts devoted only to its own spending. This is a subtle but important distinction because with some federal programs the receipts generated go back into the general fund without affecting the program's allowable spending or funding. When we say Johnson put Social Security into the general fund, or that the Democrats in 1990 put it back into the general fund, we are not being precise enough to point out the difference between a self-funded program like Social Security and a more mundane program like government cheese, whose receipts go directly back into the general fund without being tracked separately.
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