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One would think by now people would understand that Social Security is not an insurance program whereby you put money into a fund for your retirement.
Still, you hear people talk about getting back the money they put into Social Security. The money that workers today are putting into Social Security is being used to fund the checks that today's seniors and disabled receive every month. If we take that money and put it into private savings accounts, then where will the money come from to fund Social Security payments for the present recipients?
Still, you hear people talk about getting back the money they put into Social Security. The money that workers today are putting into Social Security is being used to fund the checks that today's seniors and disabled receive every month. If we take that money and put it into private savings accounts, then where will the money come from to fund Social Security payments for the present recipients?
It is estimated that it will take over $2 trillion to bridge the gap until the private program starts paying dividends to retirees and privatization takes over. But, what happens if the time comes when private accounts are depended upon to provide for the retirees and the private fund is bankrupt? My friends, that is exactly what happened to private retirement plans in the 1930's that triggered Franklin Roosevelt and the Democrats to establish Social Security. They wanted a secure financial future for our senior citizens.
Just who will decide where your money is invested? What if we had this program in place and all your retirement money was invested in Enron or World-Com? Just imagine the pressure upon the Administration to make sure those funds are placed into accounts or stocks that benefit the friends of the president. The program will be absolutely ripe for graft and corruption.
What President Bush proposes to do is nothing more than a plan to shift money that provides for the welfare of seniors and the disabled to a Republican $2 trillion dollar welfare plan for corporations. What's new?
Just who will decide where your money is invested? What if we had this program in place and all your retirement money was invested in Enron or World-Com? Just imagine the pressure upon the Administration to make sure those funds are placed into accounts or stocks that benefit the friends of the president. The program will be absolutely ripe for graft and corruption.
What President Bush proposes to do is nothing more than a plan to shift money that provides for the welfare of seniors and the disabled to a Republican $2 trillion dollar welfare plan for corporations. What's new?
Perhaps the biggest question we should be asking this administration is what will become of the people who are receiving Social Security disability payments if we turn this program into just a retirement plan, such as an IRA?
President Bush is using a trumped up crisis to promote the privatization of Social Security and return us to the days of Herbert Hoover. Paul Krugman, in an article that appeared in the New York Times on January 4, 2005, titled "Stopping the Bum's Rush," writes "privatization is a fake solution to a fake crisis." In the article he points out the same thing that our own Senator Reid has been saying - Social Security is in no immediate danger.
Bush has been saying we will have a crisis by 2018 when payments start to exceed payroll tax revenues. What he isn't telling the American people is that at that time "Social Security will be able to draw on the Social Security Trust fund which will last until 2042, according to the Social Security Administration; 2052, according to the Congressional Budget Office; maybe forever, according to many economists, who point out that these projections assume that the economy will grow much more slowly in the future than it has in the past," says Paul Krugman.
President Bush is using a trumped up crisis to promote the privatization of Social Security and return us to the days of Herbert Hoover. Paul Krugman, in an article that appeared in the New York Times on January 4, 2005, titled "Stopping the Bum's Rush," writes "privatization is a fake solution to a fake crisis." In the article he points out the same thing that our own Senator Reid has been saying - Social Security is in no immediate danger.
Bush has been saying we will have a crisis by 2018 when payments start to exceed payroll tax revenues. What he isn't telling the American people is that at that time "Social Security will be able to draw on the Social Security Trust fund which will last until 2042, according to the Social Security Administration; 2052, according to the Congressional Budget Office; maybe forever, according to many economists, who point out that these projections assume that the economy will grow much more slowly in the future than it has in the past," says Paul Krugman.
If we do have a crisis in 2050 or so, we can fix the program by means testing, (why should someone like Bill Gates receive Social Security?) or we can simply take the money now paid in taxes on Social Security, which currently go into the general fund, and put that money back into the Social Security Trust Fund.
There are more pressing problems this administration should be dealing with, like health care costs, which have driven up the cost of Medicare and Medicaid, and, along with the President's ill advised tax cuts during a time of war, plunged the nation into a sea of red.
Social Security must be secure and not used as a way to reward high rollers who play fast and loose with investors money and use questionable accounting practices to fool the public, even if they are friends of the president.
There are more pressing problems this administration should be dealing with, like health care costs, which have driven up the cost of Medicare and Medicaid, and, along with the President's ill advised tax cuts during a time of war, plunged the nation into a sea of red.
Social Security must be secure and not used as a way to reward high rollers who play fast and loose with investors money and use questionable accounting practices to fool the public, even if they are friends of the president.
