Robert wrote: > The EU is a socialist mess and its bills are coming due.
I hear people say this, but I always read the exact opposite in The Economist. That's not to say the EU is set, but, from what I've read, they're far better off than the US. One of the largest reasons is that they are net exporters meaning they need less from others than, say, the US. Put another way, they are mostly self-sufficient. > Their only alternative is to allow massive immigration > to supply the workers needed to fuel their retirees benefits. They don't need massive immigration, just more, OR they need to admit more eastern European countries, which they are doing. This will cause many short term problems with arbitrage similar to what was seen with the Euro, but it will solve their pension problems. The Ukraine alone may be able to do that. > if we address Social Security and Medicare reform now > will be much better off than either of them and Americans know it. Then they are ill-informed or fooling themselves. > Polls show that yong people overwhelmingly support reform, > including personal accounts for SS. Personal accounts does nothing to solve anything - it's simply a gimmick. The only part of Mr Bush's plan that does anything is de-linking SS from wages which typically rise faster than inflation. When that happens the result will be smaller payouts to future pensioners. It saves money because it pays out less. Medicare is the thing we should be talking about, not Social Security. However, since Mr. Bush likes to blow little things into big things (*cough* *cough* Iraq *cough*), here's my question: Why have Social Security in the first place? The goal is to take care of poor people so why don't we just wrap it into welfare and get the middle class off the rolls? If you've saved for your retirement why should the government be involved with holding your money and managing it so that Congress can squander it? Let's just drop SS for everyone that isn't destitute and, for those that are, manage them via welfare. This eliminates billions in management costs and gets rid of a gov't program that isn't needed for responsible savers. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Find out how CFTicket can increase your company's customer support efficiency by 100% http://www.houseoffusion.com/banners/view.cfm?bannerid=49 Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:5:147592 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:5 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
