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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RetiredNow who wrote (215159)	1/16/2005 8:10:20 PM
From: neolib	Respond to of 1574761

No, I don't have any problems with redistribution of wealth, but they are redistributing from the middle class downwards as well. If we want to not kill the goose that lays the golden egg, then we'd better figure out a way to allow the middle class to climb. You can kick in the taxes on people who are rich, but taxing the middle classes to death through SS, through AMT, and through property taxes is not a good idea. That is a general complaint against taxation. I don't claim to have any great insight into the optimality of any particular split between the public and private sector. It would be wonderful if economics could provide a nice clean theoretical framework for such. I know of no such theory. What I have finally come to the understand is that the SS reform is largely NOT about what is discussed. Rather, at its heart it is a modification of the PIA formula (90/32/15 bands). It should be discussed as such. Please note that Bush's proposal (as sketched so far) is something like PIA&AIME for 2/3 and sole ownership for 1/3. This is just another formula along with accounting. No problem. A computer does it all anyway. If Bush can push through actually splitting off 1/3, why can't he push through adjusting the current formula to give the exact same results? The beauty of doing the later BTW, is it makes the object crystal clear. The scam in the former is that it obscures the object behind a figleaf ("privatization" anti-government) which is politically dear to many americans hence they can be duped. Any formula could be implemented within the existing framework. The argument then becomes one of a single public entity doing the accounting vs using private businesses to do the job. The former might reduce social risk, the later would be a bit more efficient (both in theory). The root of SS is social stability for the elderly. Even if privatized, a large scale failure of SS in the private sector will see the Gov step in. So I don't see much distinction between public/private in eliminating long term government risk. It will still be there. So the question really becomes one of public sector under performance vs private sector profit generation from the funds. In that regard, I would not mind seeing some split between the two. However, the formula either uses for benefits has nothing to do with either the public or private sector implementing it. That issue should be clearly discussed on its own. No one is doing that that I see.