Bill asked:
On Friday, February 4, 2005 at 13:13:49 (-0800) Devine, James writes:
The benefits of the current retirees (etc.) come from the taxes on
current wage-earners. If some of the wage-earners' taxes go into
government-sponsored "personal" accounts instead, that means that there
are fewer tax revenues to go to pay the current retirees.
Ok, but how does that lead to the spiraling death of a fantastically
successful government policy? The whole point of the Bush program
is to kill it, is it not?
Step 1: Divert money from Social Security taxes into personal
accounts, starving the Beast.
Step 2: Having decreased tax revenues, cut the Social Security
benefits. Implement means-testing (that isolate the poor from the
rest) if possible.
Cf. According to Jason Furman, an economist, what he didn't say is
that "[u]nder Mr. Bush's plan, Social Security benefits would begin
to exceed tax revenue <strong>six years earlier, in 2012</strong>"
and the benefits-revenue gaps that Bush's plan creates would be
"<strong>$300 billion</strong> in 2027 and <strong>$400
billion</strong> in 2033," i.e. larger than the gaps would be under
the current system (emphasis added, Rosenbaum, <a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/04/politics/04facts.html";>February
4, 2005</a>).
Step 3: Diminished benefits (and, if implemented, means-testing) make
Social Security less popular than now. People support a generous
program (that benefits nearly all) more strongly than they do a
stingy program (that benefits only the poor).
Step 4: Having divided workers and made Social Security less popular,
go for the jugular.
Jim asked:
BTW, when has Congress decided not to pay SS benefits to some people?
Who were these people?
The disabled who get SSDI benefits:
<blockquote>Over the years there have been rumblings about how the
disability rolls have grown out of control, how Social Security
bureaucrats function poorly by not meeting mandates and that the
disability system is in disarray. These kinds of messages helped to
drive the devastating cuts to SSDI in the 1980s when Reagan was
president. The Reaganites arbitrarily sent tens of thousands of
disabled people notices that they were no longer "disabled" and cut
off their benefits entirely. This resulted in extreme hardship and
death in many instances. (Marta Russell, "8 Million Disabled
Workers: Social Security Privatization and Disability,"
<http://www.counterpunch.org/russell01192005.html>, January 19, 2005)
--
Yoshie
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