Hi John,

That's hilarious! But then again, the usual recommendation for retirement funding is to spread out holdings in several things. You wouldn't put all of your retirement monies in one company, organization or even investment type. So when people put all their eggs in one basket, it's kind of vulnerable no matter what they're involved in.

I guess he problem with SSI is that since it's a transfer fund, when there are more people drawing from it than are putting in, it doesn't work too well. It's like 1000 people fishing from a pond with 100 fish in it. So since the baby boomers are going to have to be supported by a lesser number of gen-X'ers, the system probably will be stretched pretty thin.

I'm pretty sure that it's wise to save money in as many diversified things as a person can. Mutual funds are probably pretty good, as they're spread out over lots of companies. And there are lots of other ways to be diversified.

Then again, I still have a bunch of Worldcom stock. Well, I mean I have the little printouts on the statements, and I have a bunch of letters from the bankrupcy attorneys.

Wayne

I'm sort of preparing myself for the possibility that there will not be enough young people paying into SSI to provide retirement for me. Right now, the workforce paying into SSI is strong. There are still plenty of baby boomers working. But I don't think that will be the case in the future. I don't expect the ratio to be right for it to work well in 30 or 40 years. The numbers of retired people will be high and too many for SSI to support. I guess we'll see, but in the meantime, I'm saving my pennies.

Wayne

• http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.mpl/nation/2976442

It is interesting that the author starts out by noting that the workbase/retiree ratio is shrinking, then proceeds to give several "solutions," which do not actually address this problem.

There is one - and ONLY one - way to keep social security. That is "means testing." In the future, retirees at a certain income level will start having the ss income decreased. At a higher income level, they will get none at all. Thus, the ratio of workers/recipients can be made as large as necessary. The poorest will still get ss, and the more comfortable will not.

All the present "solutions" involve putting more money in. That would be ok if the money were actually being invested. But it is not. All that ss has is IOU's from the government. Those IOU's will be worthless if there are no workers to pay them off.

Those of you who live long enough will see.

(Well, there is another possible solution. We could get more and more immigrants (mostly from the south) so that the young population will keep growing in proportion to the older recipients. That could happen if we do not run out of energy and other natural resources.)

Bush's "private investment accounts" is simply one way of accomplishing means testing with fewer expectations and less pain. Those who invest "wisely" now will not be getting any social security income, because they will be among the upper-income retirees. It goes along well with the spirit of ss, that it is mainly for the poorest people. For the rest (now, but not in the future) it is just one leg of the retirement tripod along with savings and private retirement plans.