It was quite a shock to read [Edward] Ramey's letter (Repair, don't destroy, Social Security). The idea that we cannot produce enough to have security unless we depend on the government to do it for us is insulting to me.

Reality is that as a Social Security recipient I could not live on my Social Security check; it was never meant to replace retirement. My return on the money I have paid into the system for 40 years amounts to one and a half percentage!

Compare that to what the retired employees of Galveston County and two other counties in Texas who chose in 1981 to leave the system for a private alternative are drawing under their plan.

Here is a good example: a person retiring today at age 65 with 40 years of deposits at an annual salary of $20,000 would retire with $383,032 in a personal account. That particular employee would receive $2,740 per month at current interest rates, compared to about $775 for Social Security. An employee making $50,000 would retire with $956,303, and would get $6,843 a month compared to $1,302 from Social Security. Just imagine, these employees would make more money retired than when they were working!

The life insurance benefit that the employer contributes pays three times the worker's salary with a minimum of $50,000 and maximum $150,000. By contrast Social Security pays a one-time death benefit of $255.

Disability insurance under the private option pays 60 percent of the employee's salary until age 65 or until the employee returns to work. I have seen the hassle some of my friends have gone through trying to get disability from Social Security, and the measly amount they get after hiring lawyers to handle their case.

And finally, at the employee's death, his or her family would inherit the rest of the retirement account. Try that with Social Security!

I recognize that [President Franklin] Roosevelt was a nice man, but I think the creation of the Social Security, while well intentioned, has done a lot of damage to the fabric of our country.

Let's face it, the Social security Fund does not exist. It consists of nothing more than IOUs the government owes to itself. There is no money in the fund; it is a pay as you go system.

By the year 2013 Social Security will begin paying out more than it takes in, and by the year 2029 Social Security outlays will have completely exhausted the so-called trust funds. In order to make the payments without cutting benefits, the trustees estimate that payroll taxes will have to rise from the current 12.4 percent to 18.8 percent.

By the way, in 1983 the government decided to do away with the option of leaving the Social Security system because they feared that more and more counties would leave in droves.

In another paragraph, Mr. Ramey mentions that “President Roosevelt had great faith in the product of our founding fathers, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights,” and goes on to say, “the latter guarantees the civil liberties of a Democracy.”

As a naturalized American citizen, I must take issue, because this wonderful adopted country of mine is not a democracy; it is a constitutional republic in which the rights of the minorities are protected from the majority. In a democracy, majority rules.

Mr. Ramey also seems to believe that the employer's contribution to Social Security is not part of his/her cost to hire the employee.

Next, Mr. Ramey states that FDR was instrumental in the passage of Social Security and Medicare. Wrong again. Medicare was signed into law by [President Lyndon Johnson] July 30, 1965.

In closing, Mr. Ramey goes into the tirade about self-centered citizens that care little about the “disadvantaged.” The answer is no, Mr. Ramey. The people you are talking about are very busy trying to make money in order to pay for the outrageous tax burden that has been imposed on the productive citizens of this country. Most of these folks are paying about 40 to 50 percent of what they make in taxes! It is time that we get some of our money back.

Gerard Jansen
Peachtree City

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