U.S. IV bag Shortage

https://www.snopes.com/did-maria-cause-an-iv-bag-shortage/

TRUE *coughs* the last sentence could be considered an opinion.


With the roads and the New Years Holiday... Please stay safe everyone

If that isn't enough here's the FDA's statement
https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm585720.htm

Pompom Rug --- Meep

Meep, this made me think of you. No t-shirts were harmed making this rug.

https://www.hometalk.com/26250981/make-your-own-pom-pom-rug?se=fol_new-20171231-2&slg=3b7b8769ca0383b3f250e59ef9526cbf-15526286&post_position=9

Can the US Government Seize Your 401k or IRA?

https://cashmoneylife.com/can-the-us-government-seize-your-401k-or-ira/
Can the US Government Seize Your 401k or IRA?
Posted by Ryan Guina on March 16, 2017 | Investing

Can the US Government seize your 401k or IRA? It seems far-fetched for a democratic government to unilaterally seize their citizens privately held retirement investments, especially in time of peace. But it wouldn’t be unprecedented. In 2012, the Irish government passed a law which placed a 0.6% levy on assets held in private pensions for 4 years. The Irish tax on private pensions was made in response to a larger financial crisis and the need to increase government revenues. Ireland isn’t the only country in recent history to seize private investments. Hungary, Argentina and France have all overhauled their private and public pension plans in recent years, in some cases seizing them in their entirety, and in others, taxing them to oblivion. There have been recent discussions of something similar in the United States, which brings up a good question – are private pensions and retirement plans in the US also at risk?

Is Your 401k or IRA in Danger of Government Seizure?
Can the government take your 401k?
Will the government scramble your nest egg?
Lets get one thing out of the way first: unless you have an IRS levy or other legal judgment against you, the US Government has no legal standing to seize the contents of your private retirement account, such as your 401k, IRA, Thrift Savings Plan, your self-employed retirement plan, or any other retirement plan.( Read more... )

Here’s why (and how) the government will ‘borrow’ your retirement savings

https://www.sovereignman.com/trends/heres-why-and-how-the-government-will-borrow-your-retirement-savings-18679/
Here’s why (and how) the government will ‘borrow’ your retirement savings
Simon Black February 15, 2016 Santiago, Chile

According to financial research firm ICI, total retirement assets in the Land of the Free now exceed $23 trillion.

$7.3 trillion of that is held in Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs).

That’s an appetizing figure, especially for a government that just passed $19 trillion in debt and is in pressing need of new funding sources.

Even when you account for all federal assets (like national parks and aircraft carriers), the government’s “net financial position” according to its own accounting is negative $17.7 trillion.

And that number doesn’t include unfunded Social Security entitlements, which the government estimates is another $42 trillion.

The US national debt has increased by roughly $1 trillion annually over the past several years.

The Federal Reserve has conjured an astonishing amount of money out of thin air in order to buy a big chunk of that debt.

But even the Fed has limitations. According to its own weekly financial statement, the Fed’s solvency is at precariously low levels (with a capital base of just 0.8% of assets).

And on a mark-to-market basis, the Fed is already insolvent. So it’s foolish to think they can continue to print money forever and bail out the government without consequence.

The Chinese (and other foreigners) own a big slice of US debt as well.

But it’s just as foolish to expect them to continue bailing out America, especially when they have such large economic problems at home.

US taxpayers own the largest share of the debt, mostly through various trust funds of Social Security and Medicare.

But again, given the $42 trillion funding gap in these programs, it’s mathematically impossible for Social Security to continue funding the national debt.( Read more... )

Social Security

https://www.snopes.com/politics/taxes/benefit.asp

Likewise, the word “entitlement” has long been the standard terminology for payments made under government programs that guarantee and provide benefits to particular groups. Persons who have demonstrated their eligibility to claim such payments are entitled (i.e., “qualified for by right according to law”) to receive them. The usage has nothing to do with pejorative connotations associated with the word (e.g., “a sense of entitlement”) which are often applied to denote people expecting or demanding something they do not merit.

As for the calculations about savings detailed in the latter half of the above-quoted example, they’re far off the mark for a number of reasons:

Assuming the aggregate Social Security contributions for any individual to be equal to 15% of his lifetime income is a flawed approach, because the required levels of Social Security contributions have varied across time, and Social Security contributions from individuals and employers combined have never “totaled 15% of your income before taxes.” The current contribution level is 12.4%, and historically the contribution rates have been significantly less. (Many people confuse Federal Insurance Contributions Act [FICA] payments, which are currently assessed at a 15.3% rate, with Social Security, but they are not the same thing. FICA payments include both Social Security and Medicare taxes.)

Assuming the Social Security contributions for any individual to be equal to a percentage of his average lifetime income is a flawed approach, because Social Security contributions have a yearly cap (i.e., contributors never pay more than a specified maximum amount, no matter how much money they make in a given year). A person who earned $80,000 in 2001 would have paid just as much into Social Security as a person who made $750,000 in 2001, so assuming that the Social Security contributions for each equalled 12.4% of their income that year would produce a grossly inflated figure in the latter case.

The dollar figures provided are a mish-mash that take neither past nor future conditions into account. It’s wrong to assume that Social Security contributions equal “15% of your income before taxes” because (as already noted), Social Security contribution levels have varied across time, they have never been as high as 15%, and there’s no guarantee of what they will be in the future. It’s wrong to assume that a typical current retiree (i.e., someone who started his working life 40+ years ago) earned an average of $30,000 per year across his lifetime, as the median household income in the U.S. didn’t even reach that level until 1993. And it’s wrong to assume that a current wage earner could safely see a 5% return on his money if it weren’t paid into Social Security, as the average interest rates for savings accounts and certificates of deposit have been well below that figure (typically under 1% or 2%) for several years now.