What really impresses this old unrecCONstructed Savage about this is how cheaply the pols and their plutoligarch sponsors believe “seniors” can be bought-off these days….with their own wage/debt-slave GreatGrandChildrens’ “money.”  This must be what happens when the “nuclear family” reaches critical mass. 

“Somewhere folks are laughing…....”

HokaHey!

“If the country is going bankrupt it is not because of the seniors on social security but because of the humongous “defense” spending.”

If the US were to stop paying out Social Security retirement and the like to rich people, however—as the legislation originally intended—it’d help a LOT—and bear in mind that the rich live a LOT longer than the unrich, so collect the maximum Social Security retirement for many, many years . . .

This business of denying eligible Seniors their next COLA is such a crock. Get the damned money out of the same bottomless sock you use to fund these two endless wars we’re currently engaged in, end of story.

Must be nice not to need $250.

If you see the payment as being an insult, or as being unnecessary, you’re probably late for your tee time. However, if you are already gratefully pre-spending it, by committing it to paying backed-up utility bills and doctor’s fees, or if you are thinking you can finally afford that new pair of socks, then you are the ones who understand what need is.

If receiving the $250 makes you feel bad, Ellen, there are any number of charitable organizations that would appreciate your help. There is forever a shortage of food and warmth in this country, especially during the wintertime. Put it where you believe it will do the most good, and be grateful you need no help, but don’t tell the rest of us we don’t need that money—-we do!

A thoroughly irresponsible article which places the focus of economic struggle exclusively among the less fortunate, both young and old.

As a senior who doesn’t depend strictly on Social Security, I don’t need the $
250.00 as a practical matter, and the concept of paying out money when COL is
down doesn’t make sense. The increase last year was higher than necessary. On
the other hand there are seniors who could use this money and I have no problem
with that. Give them more money actually. What is annoying is the attitude among
some seniors that Obama is trying to buy their vote. So no matter what he does he
is going to be criticized. For seniors who don’t need the money, there are food
banks in dire need of donations, school systems like the one in Hawaii who are in
financially strapped. Also as noted many seniors are very generous in taking care
of the needy within their own family. The sad fact is that for people like me, we
spent our working lives in an era where the middle class were not savaged and it
was possible to live a nice life even with only one spouse working. We were the
lucky ones.

“There is no question that some of the neediest Americans are elderly, especially single women.”

What Goodman (who’s a better writer/thinker than this piece suggests) seems to be trying—not very well—to say is that public subsidies would better be based on need, than on age.

The thing about Social Security that nobody even knows anymore is that its New Deal intention was far from what it has become—a sub-subsistence income for millions, while for millions more (especially high-level public and corporate retirees) it’s a second (or third or fourth, for the military, the truly rich, etc.) retirement income.

When Social Security was enacted, the quaint expectation was that everyone would pay into it, and only those who “needed” it—those without other income—would draw from it.

Meanwhile, $250 is a niggling amount of money for those who are in need—it’s a prescription, a few gallons of heating oil, an unpaid electric bill.

Goodman doesn’t mention, by the way, that many children receive Social Security second hand, via survivors benefits—or that many elderly and/or disabled (including, especially, older females of any race, and older underclass “minorities”, who worked casually as domestics or whatever, or who never were in long-term employment) have no Social Security benefits (and didn’t get the last $250 “stimulus”, and won’t get this one).

Goodman also doesn’t mention, as some here have noted, that inflation—especially at the lower end of the grocery chain—is very much alive.

That the plight of the American poor—and of the near-poor, and of the about-to-be-poor—is apparently invisible to the politicians, and to the liberal commentariat, is not encouraging.

One point Ellen Goodman makes deserves repeating:  It’s the wars, stupid.  Most of the money goes directly to fight wars.  Besides, a $250 bonus to seniors is peanuts compared to Wall Street pay-outs.  Who is kidding whom? 
  Think about it:  Grandparents who have two cents tend to give all or most of it to family or causes anyway. Some of us even spend it on gas to take our penniless, homeless friends to the grocery store or to pick up their meds.
  Those with large retirement incomes are perfectly free to give most of it away and I hope they will. But the main point is, stop the wars!

As a senior retired on a disability, sandwiched between caring for my father, a WWII veteran slowly succumbing to dementia, and babysitting two young grandchildren whose mother cannot find full time employment, I can use that $250.

My parents worked their way out of poverty through WWII, Korea and Vietnam government service into the now vanishing middle class.  Money invested in stocks evaporated by 50%.  Savings are dwindling.  I face an impoverished future.

I will surely be spending my $250 on my medicaid and food stamp eligible grandchildren for shoes and school supplies.  Is this a good enough “junior cause”?  That money will be spent stimulating the economy faster than you can say Jackie Robinson.

I am a senior that would tend to agree with Goodman’s article except for a couple of troubling points.
 
Chris Hedges wrote in “Empires of Illusion” that government officials in an attempt to keep inflation figures low, have been systematically substituting basic products it once tracked for inflation with other products that do not rise very much in price.  If that is true, and I would dearly love to see the data that is behind that claim, then perhaps inflation is much higher than is being reported and the financial situation for many of us deteoriating more rapidly than we had anticipated.

Secondly, in spite of all the rhetoric about the economy getting better, the stock market rising, etc., the enormous amount of people without any employment or low-paying employment, the huge amount of private and national debt and the country’s obsession to spend what money we do have on meaningless wars abroad, would tend to make me think that we still have a long downward economic path to trod before things meaningfully improve.

So therefore, I think I’ll hold on to my $250.

You show complete insanity or you live in a gilded life-style..
First of all you have no knowledge of the meager lifestyle most social security beneficiaries lead. Most of us have had a Medicare premium jump in Oregon of 6-700% with heaver deductibles to boot.
My Meds have increased by 50% and I only use generics. Electricity has jumped from 17% to 23% depending what part of state you live.. too bad you don’t drive a car, gas is right now $2.59- $2.90.
I really wish you would find another occupation as your rhetoric is so mythical.