“The biggest [Ponzi scheme] of them all by far, however, was launched just 15 years after Charles Ponzi’s was closed, is still running after 73 years, and is called ‘Social Security Insurance.’ In truth, there are no such funds, and benefits are paid from new, incoming funds exactly as happens in any other Ponzi scheme; the differences are that (a) the point of maximum net inflow has long since passed, but instead of going out of business, SS has prolonged the fraud by reducing benefits and increasing premiums, (b) those premiums are not volunteered but are payments compelled at gunpoint, (c) the whole scheme is perfumed by backing it with the full faith and credit of the US Government, and (d) the fuzz descends not on the operators of the scheme but upon any who refuse to support it. To call that a Ponzi scheme is to dishonor the memory of a businessman who was certainly creative and quite possibly honest.” (11/19/08)