I think that's the logical direction to go, but my understanding is that converting commercial real estate to residential is very costly.

I don't know much about any of that.

I guess they could hypothetically back the dollar with bitcoin. That would indirectly put the rest of the world on a de facto bitcoin standard.

You may want to look into this, because there is a lot of emerging evidence of substantial side effects beyond what you described being aware of.

Those include both extremely elevated cancer rates and fertility issues. Time will tell, but it is looking like the aftermath of mass mRNA vaccination will be pretty serious.

edit: I agree about the food and water points. That matters more and is all you can control at this point anyway.

Since that would mean the dollar has collapsed, they would kinda have to.

Maybe the Fed could create a bond instrument for the government to invest in: You buy our bonds and we'll buy yours.

George W. Bush proposed this and it didn't go anywhere.

In general, messing with social security is a complete non-starter politically.

There's an income limit on paying into social security, which indirectly affects eligibility. Rich people don't pay in and therefor never become eligible to withdraw.

However, people who did pay in become eligible regardless of their wealth or other income.

There's no such thing as "what they need". At any given price there's a quantity that will be economical to use (demand) and an amount that will be economical to produce (supply).

When prices are artificially suppressed demand > supply, which means there's a shortage.

Sometimes you'll hear people propose things like "no social security for people with more than $X in assets."

That seems like the most politically viable strategy to me. You're the one rubbing elbows with congressmen though, so maybe that's not really being considered.

At any given moment there's a finite amount of power being generated from hydro plants, even if they were to produce energy indefinitely.

If it had been a real trust fund, then there would have been extra funds from back then. However, it has always been a pay as you go program. Current benefits are paid from current revenues: there are no savings.

A price ceiling means that it's illegal to sell electricity above a certain price. Even the most resource rich places, still have a limited energy supply.

When the price is held down artificially, energy intensive activities will expand to take advantage of the lower prices.

Do you think raising the age is easier than means testing? I would have assumed the opposite.

Eligibility was initially set at the same age as average life expectancy, so on average people weren't eligible for long before they died.

There's nothing in the law that currently allows that. As it stands, they will keep paying out the full benefits by running huge deficits.

There are some emerging political frictions along generational lines that make me wonder how long it will be before the Boomers get their entitlements cut, though.

Price ceilings create shortages. Bitcoin miners were just one of the more convenient groups to scapegoat for the inevitable result of bad policy.

They didn't ruin anything. They still make all the payments.

All that's happened is that the accounting (which was always fake) looks different now.

Just like how pyramid schemes are sustainable.

What I mean is analogous to how defined contribution retirement plans are sustainable, but defined benefit plans are not. There was never a social security trust fund that mechanically contained all of the money or assets that would eventually get paid out. It was always organized like an unfunded liability, even if there was occasionally money somewhere that someone claimed was for social security payments.

Not really, but sort of. There was some fake accounting that was called the social security trust fund, but it was never legally binding in any way and the program was never actually set up to be financially sustainable.

On occasion, politicians have publicly justified their reckless spending as borrowing from that fake trust fund, though.

Why go through the effort, when no one seems to care anyway?