Hey Big Govt. - Please Invest My Social Security in Real Estate!

[Jim Froehlich]

This post is admittedly as much about venting as it is looking for opinions of others. Here's what crossed my mind this morning: Social Security. I'm turning 49 this year and have been working (on the books) since age 15. In general, I've assumed for the past 20 years that the Social Security Administration would be bankrupt by the time I retire (hence the passion for real estate!)  

I went to the SSA site and did some quick math using their estimators. Turns out that to date I've contributed about $196K to SSA over the years; if I work at my same pace (W2 job), I will contribute another $188K over the next 19 years and retire at age 67.  Given this, I would have to live to age 77 to even get back the money I put in (at roughly $3,100/month). Conversely, if I just STOPPED working (according to SSA estimates) and waited till age 62 for early retirement, I would get $1,700 for 9 yrs, 8 months before I got back money I contributed. So starting at age 71, I would be getting $1,700/month (and finally collecting my return!) Under this hypothetical, I would also have kept about $10K/year for myself to invest over those 20+ years.

Funny math!  Hmmm...now how to get off the books without stealing someone's identity?

So, I definitely have incentive to STOP WORKING NOW, in terms of my Social Security dividends - or at least stop contributing now to that fund! HAHA!

Reading this was even better: "The Social Security trust funds are invested entirely in U.S. Treasury securities. Like the Treasury bills, notes, and bonds purchased by private investors around the world, the Treasury securities that the trust funds hold are backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government."   ...full faith and (endless) credit of the U.S. government...

Can someone please point the Treasury Department to BP forum?  Please (Social Security Admin.) put my money in self-storage units! (Also, my Dad worked from ages 16-to-64 then died without collecting, so he told me you could take his contributions and put them in self-storage units as well!)

Any legitimate Social Security strategies beyond my cynicism?  @Thomas Rutkowski, can you please help the Treasury Dept. out?

[Greg Scott]

I find federal government program names ironic.  Often they do the opposite of what their name implies.

"Social Security" is definitely one.  It provides very little financial support and, unfortunately, encourages many to ignore funding a retirement, thus creating social insecurity.