by Guest » Fri Sep 14, 2012 11:31 am
Our insurance agent has been making my husband understand that a whole life policy is the best investment option for us. He has convinced Paul to such an extent that, he is considering diverting funds from our 401K. We're both around 50 years. As such, will it really serve the 'retirement' purpose? Possibly not, right?
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 02:44 pm Post Subject:
(Personally, I have no idea what will happen which is where my minor disagreement in this thread stems.)
No, I'm convinced you just enjoy arguing - about everything. Especially if it involves Max. This is why you remain anonymous. If we don't know who you are, you can't be held accountable for your actions or opinions.
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 04:09 pm Post Subject:
I've told you in the past the reason for my anonymity.
Unlike Max, I am not using this board to put money in my pocket. This conversation wouldn't be happening if you didn't ask me to continue it.
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 04:46 pm Post Subject:
Is Jim going to pay higher taxes now or when he retires in 20 years? We don't know.
You evidently don't pay any attention to the demographics and economics of the United States.
We have federal debt ON THE BOOKS now in excess of $16 TRILLION. It was only about $5.7 TRILLION at this time in the year 2000 -- before GW Bush was elected..
We have federal liabilities OFF THE BOOKS in the form of Social Security, Medicare, and the Prescription Drug Plan which, today, are just under $121 TRILLION. When Congress created Social Security in the 1930s, there were about 20-30 workers for each person receiving a retirement benefit.
Today there are barely more than two, and when the last of the Baby Boomers retires in 2026-2030 or so, there will barely be one person working for each one of us collecting a benefit (if they are still paying one by then). The current plan is to begin reducing those payments in 2037 by 25% (just 10 years ago, the same plan was going to be implemented in 2042 -- we've lost five years in the last ten. What does that tell you?
Every idiot running for President, and every one elected as President, foolishly talks about "strengthening Social Security". It cannot be done without raising taxes -- even if we give legal status to 12,000,000 illegal immigrants, which would only make things worse. The dikes that failed during Hurricane Katrina had more strength than Social Security does. But Congress just keeps kicking the can down the road.
The 2% reduction in taxes Mark mentioned above -- that, too, makes matters worse, because those 2% were Social Security contributions, not income taxes. All it has done is deplete the Trust Fund (which is full of nothing by IOUs anyway) even more. That's why there will be no money to pay disability benefits in three years. Will we say to the disabled in America, "Go back to work?" No, we'll keep sending them checks and increase the unfunded liabilities even faster.
Friend, there is no hope for America without higher taxes. As the Social Security Trustees said in this year's report (and half of them are Obama's people), taxes need to be raised sooner rather than later. They want them increased NOW. But this is an election year, and that won't happen.
HIGHER TAXES ARE INEVITABLE. Period. When doesn't matter. It's a fact that only fools and politicians fail to accept.
The current debt exceeds the Gross Domestic Product. The unfunded liabilities of Social Security, Medicare, and the PDP exceed the combined assets of every person, business, and government agency in America by $27 TRILLION. We have no prospect of paying off either of those liabilities -- but they are real liabilities, and the only real way to attempt to pay them down is through higher taxes.
You can spit into the wind with your "higher tax rates don't have to equal higher government revenues" -- exactly what is the point of a higher tax rate if not to raise government revenues? -- and other such crapola as a way to excuse your reluctance to admit your ignorance of these facts. You should become a politician -- you have a natural ability to make statements that sound good but are meaningless. You ability to not commit to anything makes you a perfect fit for a seat in Congress.
As for this statement:
Unlike Max, I am not using this board to put money in my pocket.
the only money that has gone into my "pocket" from participating here is the combined effect of $0.22 or less per post that is credited to "members", and it amounts to a couple of hundred dollars in three years -- boy! am I getting rich as a result!!
I have not sold anything to anyone, or charged anyone anything for the assistance I have freely offered to folks. But some of them have benefitted to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars when it comes to collecting death benefits or auto and homeowners claims.
Let me back up one minute -- I almost forgot about this one. A couple of years ago, there was a $100 bill that unexpectedly showed up in my mail. It was from an attorney who asked for some advice on how to deal with a life insurance company on a death claim. He was able to obtain a $10,000 payment from the insurance company for a widow, and, in the note he enclosed with the "benjamin:, said he charged her $1000 to do that. He thanked me for my advice since insurance was not his area of practice, and gratuitously gave me 10% of his 10%. I did not ask for it, it just happened.
Marl Colbert has encouraged and assisted me to share my knowledge and experience with trial attorneys who need expert witnesses for their cases. That was a result of my efforts here, but not something I solicited. Now I have several cases under retainer across the country. That's just good fortune and answers to prayers.
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 05:01 pm Post Subject:
"CA-licensed Life & Disability Analyst. CA Insurance Lic #0596197. Also investigating insurance company abuses, and providing litigation support/expert witness services. Send me your questions, and I'll send you my answers."
Unless you are turning down all business of people who contact you, nobody in their right mind would not consider you to be advertising on this site.
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 05:04 pm Post Subject:
Send me your questions, and I'll send you my answers."
Absolutely FREE service!
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 05:11 pm Post Subject:
Max,
You are a Republican. Do you believe, "higher taxes = higher government revenues". Many Republicans don't believe that is true.
Do you believe that raising taxes will solve our problems? I don't. Like you, I do believe that taxes will be raised. Unlike you, I certainly can't state this with any certainty.
If history is any guide, some people will face tax increases and some will face tax decreases and the demographics of those people will always be changing.
You are using our country's financial situation to back up your opinion that taxes will be raised and state it as a fact. Can't you use the same arguments to say that life insurance proceeds will be taxed in the future and state that as a fact? Can't you use the same arguments to say that the estate exemption won't exist in the future and state that as a fact? Or to say that Roth IRA withdrawals will be taxed and state it as a fact?
You have the great ability to turn your opinions into universal facts.
Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2012 06:01 pm Post Subject:
Sorry, for what it's worth, I'm a registered voter in the Green Party here in CA. Democrats, Republicans . . . they all disgust me. A few of the Tea Party-ers seem to be on the right path.
But let's get something straight. You commented:
Unless you are turning down all business of people who contact you
You are making an assumption that people are contacting me to buy products or services. That isn't happening. I've had maybe three people ask about life insurance and all of them were in other states and, yes, I turned that business down, because it is not fair to them to have to deal with someone thousands of miles away when there is probably someone who can do just as good a job within a mile or two.
Mostly I get questions. How do I ask the insurance company this or that? What am I entitled to? What happens when . . .? That's what I get., I don't get, I want to buy insurance from you, how much is it?
You are using our country's financial situation to back up your opinion that taxes will be raised and state it as a fact.
Higher taxes or bankruptcy? Higher taxes or no government service? Higher taxes or no road repairs? Higher taxes or no military? Higher taxes or no Social Security/Medicare? Higher taxes or no schools? Higher taxes or no police officers or firefighters? Higher taxes or no public parks? Higher taxes or no libraries? Higher taxes or no trash collections?
Fact or fiction? We have encouraged folks in America to believe that the government is supposed to provide all these things for free.
One day, not too long ago, in his quest for the women's vote, Obama stands in front of the TV cameras and tells the fertile women of America, "You will get birth control. It will be FREE. Your insurance company will pay for it."
Is that fact or opinion? The government writes a law that says contraceptives for women must be dispensed without a copay imposed by an insurance company. Do insurance companies do anything for free?
The President says it's free. The woman has no copay, so she believes it's free. Then we all get an increase in our health insurance premiums to provide the freebies. Not a tax, of course. But what happens in a few years when health insurance companies can no longer make a profit, even if they were to charge higher premiums (which they can't if the state regulators don't give them approval)?
One-by-one, if Obamacare persists, the commerical health insurance industry will die. Fact or opinion? Well, today, that's my opinion. Because we don't know that Obamacare, when push comes to shove, will actually be sustained in the long term. State laws have changed, insurance companies have figured out, for the moment, how to make things work, but the actuaries are getting gray hairs trying to plan for the future.
When there are no more insurance companies left to pay the bills, then what? We'll end up with the single payer system the Democrats were too scared to enact, even when they had control of Congress and their man in the Oval Office, because, in their hearts, for once, they knew American does not want that.
But we could all be facing that in the future. That, too, would require higher taxes. But I'm not going there today.
By all accounts, if the Democrats regain control of the House, taxes WILL go up, almost immediately. It's only the recalcitrant Republicans who currently have control that are preventing it from happening. But even they know that higher taxes have to happen. They just don't want to appear to be forced into making it happen. When it happens, it will be their "idea" that the time is right.
Between Congress, the President, and the Federal Reserve, we have so utterly screwed up the fiscal and monetary policies of the country that there is NO WAY OUT but to raise taxes. No one is willing to cut services, no one is willing to make the hard decisions, like ending Social Security for persons under (pick an age), like deciding that we are truly no longer the world's policeman, and let jerks like Karzai defend himself.
Truth be told, we couldn't cut enough federal services today to make a dent in our $16 TRILLION debt without raising taxes. That would take decades. The longer we put it off, the worse it will get.
So, go ahead, sit back and relax, your home mortgage interest deduction is safe this year. But, answer this question, if they don't raise tax rates (your words not mine), and they finally do away with the last tax deduction of substance for individual taxpayers, would your taxes go up or not? Of course they would go up. Instead of getting that $2000-$3000 refund, you would probably owe an additional $1000 in taxes. Eliminating deductions raised taxes. Has nothing to do with the rate people pay.
To pay for Obamacare, they reduced the amount people like my wife can defer into her HSA from $5000 a couple of years ago to just $2500. What effect did that have? Added about $700 to her annual income tax withholding. The HIGHER TAXES are already here.
And the proud politicians would stand up and say, "We did not raise your income tax rates." Fact or opinion? Do you have more or less in your pocket? Fact or opinion?
What I pay is what I don't have for other uses. The oil companies tell me that, adjusted for inflation, gasoline at the pump is no more expensive today than it was in 1970. Fact or opinon? In 1970, I could fill the 9 gallon tank of my 1970 Toyota Corolla for less than three dollars at 30.9 cents per gallon. Today, I fill the 18 gallon tank on my 2005 Buick Rendevous, and it costs $65. Part of that is higher federal motor vehicle fuel taxes and state sales tax. Some of it is to reimburse the owner of the gas station for the taxes he pays on his employees' pay and his income tax on his meager profit. Some of it is reimbursement to the oil refinery to cover the taxes on their profits and their employees, and on up the food chain to the oil company to reimburse them for the money they pay to Congress to get legislation passed that favors them financially. What goes around comes around.
Gas is no more expensive today? I could have driven half a year in 1971 on what I spend to drive in two weeks.in 2012.
I make no argument, state no opinion about tax rates. The rates are meaningless in the bigger picture. When I state that taxes will be higher in the future, there is no doubt in anyone's mind, save yours, that this is a true statement. What comes out of our pocket will be more than it is today. There can be no other outcome.
It could happen as soon as 1-1-2013. And it's not just federal taxes. It's state and local taxes, too. They all have the same effect.
So while you keep your head in the sand, be sure to keep breathing, so you don't miss it.
Posted: Wed Jan 02, 2013 08:20 pm Post Subject:
Very nice article and right to the point. I don't know if this is in fact the best place to ask but do you people have any thoughts on where to hire some professional writers? Thx :)
Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 02:54 am Post Subject:
"(and income taxes are going to increase in the future)"
He's stating it as a fact. We don't know what will happen.
If this happens and that happens....blah, blah, blah. I'm simply pointing out that we don't know what will happen.
However, since higher tax rates don't have to equal higher government revenues and because politicians care about re-election, higher tax rates in the future certainly are anything but a certainty.
I know the difference between fact and opinion. You are stating an opinion. You may want to think that I'm nuts for disagreeing with your opinion.
Hmmmm, kinda funny how things work out.
Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 05:44 pm Post Subject:
Except for high earners, income taxes haven't gone up. Regardless, this isn't a conversation about whether his opinion turns out to be correct or not. It's the issue of posting opinions as facts.
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