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Old 09-11-2010, 07:18 AM   #61
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It is "she can vote and most of the time contract."


I'm guessing here but, can you be competent enough to vote but not to sign a contract.

Actually that's not quite true assuming the individual was not declared "incompetent" by the court system.

My adult disabled son is on SSD, votes, and can enter contracts (and has done so, for his apartment).

However, he cannot receive direct SSD payments. The SSA administration names a third party (representative payee) to be responsible for the spending of those funds. This named person does not have to be a relative, but a person that looks after the interests of an individual (such as a lawyer/trust).

I'm also responsible to submit to an annual audit of how the funds were spent, including year to year savings (if any - that never happens; his living expenses are much higher than the SSD benefit is).

Even though being recognized by the SSA as disabled, from a legal standpoint since he is an adult and not declared incompetent by a court of law, he can enter into formal contracts with no counter-signature (one of the reasons I don't allow payment for internet in his apartment).

It's a slippery slope if you start trying to declare if somebody is competent based solely on their disability. Even a "single type disability" contains many variations (as my son, who is a high-functioning autistic) and to limit their life based upon a "tag" would really be a problem from the legal view (Martha can comment on my view).

IOW, you are "legally competent" until considered by the courts not to be....
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Old 09-11-2010, 08:23 AM   #62
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Interesting how this thread has moved from the OP re "will the masses jump on the LBYM bandwagon and spoil the magic of it for those who have been riding it for a long time" (at least that's what I think the OP's message is--or else we need a poll about Metallica ) to benefits for disabled people. Love these forums.

As someone who has several very smart grifters and grifter wannabes in the family tree, I find it so sad that these people always know exactly how to get what they need (both within and outside the gummint safety nets), or at least act like they do. We keep our distance from them, but my heart goes out to the people Martha talks about and of course rescueme's son. No solutions, just saying.
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Old 09-11-2010, 08:35 AM   #63
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Beyond the hijack aspect, it's interesting to me that the Kuran/Quran burning thread was shut down while this one persists in it's current direction...
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Old 09-11-2010, 08:42 AM   #64
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Beyond the hijack aspect, it's interesting to me that the Kuran/Quran burning thread was shut down while this one persists in it's current direction...
Maybe it has something to do with the shut down thread having absolutely no link to anything involving finances/retirement/investing, purely politics and religion.

But that's just a guess.
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Old 09-11-2010, 10:08 AM   #65
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Well the Jimmy Buffett/Metallica analogy turned out to be bit of a red herring in hindsight...like others have said, it costs nothing to join popular bandwagons (other than perhaps the price of admission).

But many of the responses hit on the intended query; that is, will the masses embrace LBYM with an eye towards FI or RE as a result of the structural/secular changes underway in the economy.

Time will tell...I do believe the Millennials will drive the eventual trend for the most part.

Check out a book called The Fourth Turning...the premise is fascinating.
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Old 09-11-2010, 10:22 AM   #66
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Interesting how this thread has moved.
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Old 09-11-2010, 10:45 AM   #67
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No, I don't believe LBYM will become a new mantra in this country anytime soon.
I think LBYM has been a mantra for a small percentage of the population all along, I think the percentage of the population that lives LBYM has increased and will continue to increase. IMO, a significant percentage of the population has had a wake up call. I think the tea party movement is one outlet for this new found economic awareness, albeit a political one. My bet is that future growth in consumer spending will be anemic for years to come.
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Old 09-11-2010, 11:05 AM   #68
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While tangential at best, much like the topic of balancing the budget, the devil is in the details. What is "constitutional"? Who is "disabled"? What is in the "national interest"? How do we promote the "general welfare"? What "provides for the common defense"?

But back on topic, it could be that we have a reset toward LBYM, and a distrust of the stock market, much like after the Great Depression. Or not...
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Old 09-11-2010, 02:54 PM   #69
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Interesting how this thread has moved from the OP re "will the masses jump on the LBYM bandwagon and spoil the magic of it for those who have been riding it for a long time"
Actually, anything at all would have been an improvement on that idea.

Ha
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Old 09-11-2010, 05:51 PM   #70
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Wow! Didn't think I would offend or insult anyone anyone on this board with my post. It was perhaps a trenchantly worded post, I admit. And perhaps politically incorrect. But the truth is the truth. Lots of people game the Welfare / Disability system, with its many programs, for financial gain and to avoid working. Those of us who do not come into personal contact with this reality may choose to pretend it is not there.
Just a reminder that lots of people who have been on welfare DON'T game the system, but are simply using it as a survival net.

I have a brother who lives in a small town where the major employer was a sawmill. The mill shut down, which had a nasty cascading effect on the entire town, as millworkers stopped spending, which caused small businesses supplying the workers and mill to fail, which unemployed more people, etc. Unemployment in the town reached about 40%.

The usual response I hear from those in love with ideological solutions is that these folks should just move and get new jobs elsewhere. OK. Know of any big sawmills that are hiring and willing to pay something to help with relocation? Any sort of heavy industrial businesses that are doing lots of hiring? No, in the US, please.

A lot of these folks were just scraping by. They can't come up with moving expense money plus first and last months rent. They're trying, looking for work, doing odd jobs, off-the-books work from weeding to farm labor, and about the only thing getting them food on the table is that welfare WIC card (modern food stamps). A fair number need medical care. (Work in a sawmill for 30-40 years and see how your pulmonary function holds up.)

Yes, I know that back in the Ayn Rand School for Tots we were all taught that "A is A" and "Helping is Futile", but we don't use the treadmill and workhouses any more. I'd rather get these folks some retraining and assistance to get back on their feet. The local welfare program gets these folks some food, a few hundred a month to cover expenses, and hooks them up with one of several training and relocation services operated by various charities.
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Old 09-11-2010, 07:58 PM   #71
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I think the percentage of the population that lives LBYM has increased and will continue to increase. IMO, a significant percentage of the population has had a wake up call.
Personally, I agree with FIREdreamer, Joshua and rescueme: being unable to spend money you don't have - because no one will give you credit - is not the same thing as making a conscious, voluntary decision to diligently put aside part of the money you do have.


Human beings have surprisingly short memories. Greed, stupidity and laziness are commonplace. When credit becomes available again, I suspect that many people will abandon the new religion and resume their free-spending ways.

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I don't believe it will [stick] because it was not as painful as the Great Depression.
Agree. The recent recesssion was nothing compared to the Depression.

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The usual response I hear from those in love with ideological solutions is that these folks should just move and get new jobs elsewhere. OK. Know of any big sawmills that are hiring and willing to pay something to help with relocation? Any sort of heavy industrial businesses that are doing lots of hiring? No, in the US, please.
Some truth to this. It's also true that many government-funded retraining schemes are rather unrealistic (there is a limited market for newly-minted 54-year-old computer programmers).


On the other hand, people (especially young people) have to be realistic about their own situations, and read the writing on the wall. One can no longer drop out of school and expect to get the sort of unskilled or semi-skilled, unionized job that one's father or mother enjoyed. Globalization has changed things (and for the better).
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Old 09-12-2010, 05:39 AM   #72
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First off, thanks to everyone who has posted on this thread. I've been lurking on this forum since last May (joined in June) and this is one of the reasons I continue to come back.

Sure, there's not much FIRE content here - but the range of opinions and, well, topics in this one thread alone are impressive. And the respect shown for each other? Coming from years of posting on online sports forums - I'm floored.

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Personally, I agree with FIREdreamer, Joshua and rescueme: being unable to spend money you don't have - because no one will give you credit - is not the same thing as making a conscious, voluntary decision to diligently put aside part of the money you do have.

Human beings have surprisingly short memories. Greed, stupidity and laziness are commonplace. When credit becomes available again, I suspect that many people will abandon the new religion and resume their free-spending ways.

Agree. The recent recesssion was nothing compared to the Depression.
I agree with this. One thing that the recent recession has that the Depression didn't is advertising-run media. (Can't think of a better term.) Everything - television, radio, internet - throws in your face how much better your life will be if you don't LBYM (or at least ignore it).

I wore hand-me-downs until high school, when I bought my own clothes. Me and my siblings not only bought our first vehicles, we paid for insurance. If we couldn't afford it, there was always the bus. (And I took a bus 12 miles to classes in my second year of college while living with my parents.)

Forget about "peer pressure". The "media pressure" to do the opposite of LBYM (LAYM?) is enough to stem any mass change in this country.
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Old 09-12-2010, 06:38 AM   #73
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This is an emotional topic for many people. They seem to either latch on to the emotions of:

"How dare you kick the poor,needy, and down-trodden unfortunates of society"

Or

"Bums at best, criminals at worst"


Unfortunately we have both and there is no effective way to sort them out.

I think we all would agree that the people that game the system should be cut-off.

One of the most prevalent forms of the fraud is to work for cash and collect benefits.

Another common scam is for the woman and children to get on welfare and the (ne'er-do-well boyfriend or ex-husband move in the section 8 house and hold down a job). I read once about a guy getting a divorce and abandoning the family (on paper) so the family would get welfare and he would work.

This does happen... more than you might think! But it is not fair to paint all with that brush.
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Old 09-12-2010, 07:10 AM   #74
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Personally, I agree with FIREdreamer, Joshua and rescueme: being unable to spend money you don't have - because no one will give you credit - is not the same thing as making a conscious, voluntary decision to diligently put aside part of the money you do have.

Human beings have surprisingly short memories. Greed, stupidity and laziness are commonplace. When credit becomes available again, I suspect that many people will abandon the new religion and resume their free-spending ways. .
Not disagreeing, just pointing out that a shift from saving more has not happened yet, and the trend appears to be intact.

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Old 09-12-2010, 08:17 AM   #75
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.............
Another common scam is for the woman and children to get on welfare and the (ne'er-do-well boyfriend or ex-husband move in the section 8 house and hold down a job)..............
I saw way too much of this when I was working for Habitat for Humanity. I finally got tired of working on houses for able bodied people that had more household income than I did.

Too bad, 'cause most of the clients really did deserve and appreciate a break.
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Old 09-12-2010, 09:21 AM   #76
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This is an emotional topic for many people. They seem to either latch on to the emotions of:

"How dare you kick the poor,needy, and down-trodden unfortunates of society"

Or

"Bums at best, criminals at worst"

Since most have us have spent our entiure lives in a welfare society of one degree or another, our baseline assumption is that we should provide for others, that they are somehow the responsibility of those who are doing OK. This is really a very new idea in societies, and I believe it is an idea on the way out. I believe the first state sponsored or mandated welfare provisions were relatively small, and mostly directed at industrial workers in Germany, maybe 120-130 years ago. The real kick-off came after WW2 when Britain's voters kicked out Churchill and the Tories and elected a Labor government. Perhaps coincidentally their economy trended down until the dark bottom in the early 70s. What finally financed the UK welfare system was North Sea oil and gas. With that beginning to wind down, it remains to be seen what will happen. One way or another, the UK standard of living will decrease, as will ours here in the US for similar reasons.

Victorian England was a very prosperous country, a prosperous empire really, yet people starved. Starving people in western countries today would be hard to find, unless a 240 pound food stamp recipient might be considered to be starving.

I certainly do not know, and I may be too far along in life to see the playout, but my guess is that attitudes are hardening about a hard working productive class being forced to support a permanent underclass. I would say that at present, an unspoken motivation to continue current measures is to avoid violence against people and property. In other words, a protection racket.

The same pressures will affect those of us who are retired. As various economists have pointed out, once you are retired, no matter how much money you might have saved, your consumption of goods and services necessarily comes from the current production of goods and services in the economy. Since the most able sectors of the US and most other western economies have gone on a baby strike, I think things are certainly not looking max rosy.

This doesn't necessarily have to work out well, does it?

Ha
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Old 09-12-2010, 09:45 AM   #77
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Yes Ha, it doesn't necessarily work well. And I think we have a culture of wishful thinking. If only so and so is elected all will be ok. If only we return to our xyz values all will be ok. If only people would apply themselves they will get work. I'll play the lottery but I won't wear sunscreen. And our worries are often worries that have no real utility. Gay marriage. Content of the pledge of allegiance. School prayer. Flag burning. Location of Mosques. Instead of saving your money, taking care of your health, and keeping your own skills up to date so you can be agile, mobile and hostile, as Uncle Mick would say.

Anyone read Amazon.com: Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America eBook: Barbara Ehrenreich: Kindle Store I just got the book but haven't read it yet. She claims we have as a society a reckless penchant for self delusion.

Nevertheless, I engage in self delusion. It helps me sleep at night.
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Old 09-12-2010, 10:14 AM   #78
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Martha, thanks for mentioning this book. I reserved it at the library. It will take a while, but I think it will be worth it.
I hope you will report on it after you have had a chance to read it over.

I have been reading Victorian fiction. The heavy reality of moral choice, and also of chance, seems to have been part of everyday Victorian. consciousness. They seem to understand that tragedies and injustices will happen, and they will likely not be made right.


I agree with you that we Americans tend to be deluded. And if our delusions ever do get challenged, the media will help us restore them quickly enough.

Ha
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Old 09-12-2010, 11:55 AM   #79
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I haven't read Bright-sided, but I usually find Barbara Ehrenreich to be worthwhile.

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This is really a very new idea in societies ... I believe the first state sponsored or mandated welfare provisions were relatively small, and mostly directed at industrial workers in Germany, maybe 120-130 years ago. The real kick-off came after WW2 when Britain's voters kicked out Churchill and the Tories and elected a Labor government.
Certainly the modern welfare state is a recent creation, but the idea of tax revenue being spent to provide (very) basic necessities for the sick and needy is not new. For example, the English poor law system dates back to Elizabethan times.

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Victorian England was a very prosperous country, a prosperous empire really, yet people starved.
Quite correct, on both accounts.

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I would say that at present, an unspoken motivation to continue current measures is to avoid violence against people and property. In other words, a protection racket.
Perhaps. But a bigger motivation for wealth transfers is simple vote-buying.

Personally, I don't worry or think about this topic very much. I'm sure that most (all?) welfare systems are imperfect, but of course that's true of every human creation. And it is good to know that support is there for people who genuinely need it (which I hope will never include any of us, but one never knows).

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Victorian. consciousness ... seem(s) to understand that tragedies and injustices will happen, and they will likely not be made right.
Cf. Mrs. Jellyby!
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