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America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

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Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#51

Post by foxyv »

ecshafer wrote: post #36
foxyv wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does the government get to decide when we retire?

The government decides when we can retire and they help us out. You can stop working today if you want, Government shouldn't pay you for it for no reason. Your duty as a citizen is to work and build your nation, eventually the government pays back that service with benefits.

This isn't something the government gives you. It is something they have confiscated and held on to.

> Your duty as a citizen is to work and build your nation

What about the duty of the trust fund babies and idle wealthy? What about the duty of the capital owners? Why is the retirement age going up instead of down as productivity increases?

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#52

Post by nancyminusone »

Noumenon72 wrote: post #32

"Saving regret" ought to also refer to when you have saved too much. The shocks in that case would be things like "inflation ate away all my savings before I got to use them" or "the government confiscated my savings via wealth taxes" or just generally "the government made me spend 37% of my income on saving when I wanted to use it to raise kids."

That seems like it causes a different category of problems than "I wish I had saved more but I didn't and now I have nothing"

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#53

Post by foxyv »

paxys wrote: post #48
foxyv wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This boils down to a "Might makes right" claim. It doesn't answer the question why. Only how.

What question do you want answered exactly? Why we have governments and not anarchy?

Why does the government get to decide when we retire?

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#54

Post by Aurornis »

ecshafer wrote: post #20
InkCanon wrote: post #12

Singapore's economic policies are complicated and often misdirecting. I'll break down the misconceptions. The primary purpose of CPF is not a pension scheme. It is structured as a massive forced bond purchase scheme by citizens. Financially what happens is the 37% of citizen income buys a long term bond (till retirement age, on average decades) at rock bottom interest rates (it's pegged to the overnight rate or a min…

The CPF sounds pretty clever. It covers a major individual cost and need (retirement, medical, housing) instead of just throwing it into a tax. It makes the government money. This sounds like a win win kind of policy.

> instead of just throwing it into a tax. It makes the government money

It is a tax, but with extra steps.

The reason it makes the government money is because they’re collecting the extra interest that citizens would have earned if they were free to invest it on their own.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#55

Post by paxys »

foxyv wrote: post #53
paxys wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What question do you want answered exactly? Why we have governments and not anarchy?

Why does the government get to decide when we retire?

Like I said, they don't. You can retire today. They decide when you get access to a national retirement plan. Citizens of the country vote for that plan and how it is implemented.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#56

Post by nozzlegear »

irishcoffee wrote: post #14
vladms wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it more a cultural issue though? As a European, I think many Americans take pride and love to succeed "on their own" and accept they could "die trying" (exaggerating a bit, hence the quotes, but the feeling holds). Yes, the systems are amenable to acquiring more money, but I would claim that all that the richest need to do is to push the idea that "anyone can make it" - which was probably (more) true 50 years a…

Most Americans I know in my middling years are counting on the government to support them in their old age, quite the opposite that you’re exposed to via online manipulation hitpeices.

Depends on which cohort of Americans you're talking about, but it's less that they see it as the government supporting them and more that they see it as the government "giving back what they owe." Social Security and Medicare have always been framed as something you pay into now and get back later in life, like you're lending money to the government. That's why most Americans don't view it as government support in the way Europeans do, and why they see no hypocrisy in spitting venom at "government handouts" while cashing their Social Security check and Medicare coverage.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#57

Post by everforward »

ecshafer wrote: post #20
InkCanon wrote: post #12

Singapore's economic policies are complicated and often misdirecting. I'll break down the misconceptions. The primary purpose of CPF is not a pension scheme. It is structured as a massive forced bond purchase scheme by citizens. Financially what happens is the 37% of citizen income buys a long term bond (till retirement age, on average decades) at rock bottom interest rates (it's pegged to the overnight rate or a min…

The CPF sounds pretty clever. It covers a major individual cost and need (retirement, medical, housing) instead of just throwing it into a tax. It makes the government money. This sounds like a win win kind of policy.

To me it sounds like a tax structured in a strange way so it doesn't obviously read as a tax.

It's essentially a forced loan to the government at subpar rates. The "tax" is the delta between what the government pays out for the bonds vs what a bond of equivalent risk in the free market would have paid.

The magnitude of the investment also probably makes it impractical for anyone but the very wealthy to retire before that starts paying out. Most other countries have lower rates on their retirement schemes, which makes it feasible for more people to live on their savings for a few years before the government retirement scheme kicks in. E.g. in the US it's pretty feasible for the upper middle/lower upper classes to retire a few years before Social Security kicks in, especially if they're willing to live frugally.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#58

Post by goolz »

ecshafer wrote: post #36
foxyv wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does the government get to decide when we retire?

The government decides when we can retire and they help us out. You can stop working today if you want, Government shouldn't pay you for it for no reason. Your duty as a citizen is to work and build your nation, eventually the government pays back that service with benefits.

These days I wonder about that duty I have. It sure felt obligatory some time ago. I thought of myself as a patriot and that the rule of law was something we we should be proud of. A country whose own anthem spoke of "liberty and justice for all".

The current trajectory makes my question a lot of things, including this whole "government pays back that service with benefits" as it will be some time before I ever see a penny of SSI.

A lot of our taxes in this country seem like a giant waste or are grossly inefficient at best.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#59

Post by seanmcdirmid »

foxyv wrote: post #53
paxys wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What question do you want answered exactly? Why we have governments and not anarchy?

Why does the government get to decide when we retire?

Couldn’t you say the same thing about social security or pensions? There is a lot of economic forces that direct people to work until a certain age, the government controlling a benefit is only one of them. As to why, you’ll need to dissect representative democracies in Singapore’s case.

Re: America vs. Singapore: You can't save your way out of economic shocks

#60

Post by zozbot234 »

ecshafer wrote: post #20
InkCanon wrote: post #12

Singapore's economic policies are complicated and often misdirecting. I'll break down the misconceptions. The primary purpose of CPF is not a pension scheme. It is structured as a massive forced bond purchase scheme by citizens. Financially what happens is the 37% of citizen income buys a long term bond (till retirement age, on average decades) at rock bottom interest rates (it's pegged to the overnight rate or a min…

The CPF sounds pretty clever. It covers a major individual cost and need (retirement, medical, housing) instead of just throwing it into a tax. It makes the government money. This sounds like a win win kind of policy.

> It covers a major individual cost and need (retirement, medical, housing) instead of just throwing it into a tax.

Forced saving makes it a tax. It's essentially no different than payroll taxes in the U.S. that fund Social Security. Buying government bonds is still marginally better accounting than a complete Ponzi scam like Social Security in the U.S., but even that ultimately amounts to the same thing - the government is paying itself, so it's a wash.

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