Donald Trump warned Tuesday that if the Democrats don’t approve funding, there are dangers to the future of Social Security and Medicare.
Trump said at a press conference that when he asked Democrats for feedback on the funding bills, one said, “It means death.”
“There’s nothing about death,” Trump said. “Theirs is death because they’re going to lose Medicaid, they’re going to lose Social Security, they’re going to lose Medicare, all of those things are going to be gone because the whole country would be bankrupt, and you’re not going to have any kind of medical insurance.”
No, it’s a big insurance scheme, but its finances have been fucked with. The original intent was that the money went into a trust fund isolated from other government finances. It didn’t take long for some scumbag to realize that the trust fund could be used as collateral for loans, or “lent” directly from the trust fund to other government activities.
Also, even if it’s funded year-to-year, if the cap on contributions were lifted, the system could be self-funding, or nearly so. But the Republicans (and some conservative Democrats) have been trying to kill it since FDR started it, and the specious argument is always that it’s not affordable.
The US in 1935 could afford it. The only difference now is a matter of priorities and who’s in charge.