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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter O'Brien who wrote (430505)	7/21/2003 7:03:14 PM
From: Steve Dietrich	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

<<The widows and orphans are being compensated for a loss. The early beneficiaries of the SS program received a windfall, pure and simple.>> My point is you can't compare SS to a retirement account. SS is also an insurance program as well as a transfer of wealth program. You can't fairly compare it to a retirement account. The beneficiaries of any new program receive a windfall, just like those who will get a prescription drug benefit from medicare, or those who went to college on the G.I. bill. We tax people and then spend that money on other people. One of those things is retirement money for our retired workers. Another is providing insurance for the disabled, widows and orphans. Do retired workers deserve it for contributing to our economy and tax base for their entire working lives? Is it good social policy to protect our elderly against living in poverty? Should they not get these benefits (and should no one fund them) because in the past people didn't get those benefits or pay as much in taxes? Obviously it's debatable, but most would say yes to SS. The dishonesty is describing it as a retirement program where the government takes your money, holds it for you, and then gives it back, which just isn't the case. And in fact that would be a very stupid way to do things. The government should neither hoard money nor run chronic deficits. It would create economic distortions. The federal government should pretty much pay as it goes, allowing for economic fluctuations and uncertainties of course. Steve