So why do we NEED private accounts if IRAs and Annuities exist ?

[EVDebs]

It seems it's just an attempt by corps to lessen the amount of payroll tax by, what, 4% ? Is that the real goal here ? I don't get it. And I saw Thomas Friedman the other night on Russert blast Bush on this SS thing. If anyone has a tape of that, use it and run with it !

[tk2kewl]

1. so we can start paying taxes to corporations as well as government

:mad:

[stillcool]

2. To cook the books?

[Eric J in MN]

3. The plan is to ruin Social Security, because it's the most succesful

govt. program.

Rightwingers can't stand the existence of a successful govt. program, becuase in their bizarre world, the private sector is always the answer.

Example from Wall St. Journal op-ed columnists:

http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB110748100533045786-search,00.html?collection=wsjie%2F30day&vql_string=Mary+Anastasia%3Cin%3E%28article%2Dbody%29

Chile's Personal Pension
Accounts a Failure? Says Who?

By MARY ANASTASIA O'GRADY
February 4, 2005; Page A9

George W. Bush's plan to create personal retirement accounts is not simply an actuarial adjustment designed to boost old-age financial security. It is a lunge for the jugular vein of the welfare state.

This explains why Democrats sent up a collective moan during the State of the Union address when Mr. Bush repeated his intention to allow people to own their retirement savings. It also explains why the news pages of the New York Times are editorializing against reform, most recently with a tendentious report on the world's most successful government-created private pension system in Chile.

Mr. Bush has promised not to reduce benefits for anyone over 55, so the "scare grandma" strategy doesn't pack nearly the punch it used to. Plan B of the opposition is to terrify the rest of us into clinging to the nanny state for fear of elderly destitution.

[sandnsea]

4. To become the Planatation Society

Er, ownership society. Where every single American has money wrapped up in the corporate machine so we'll support the corporate wars and not complain when we exploit other people's labor and destroy the evironment for profit.

[Spinzonner]

5. The real goal is to defund Social Security

and eventually starve or eliminate it.

The rest is window dressing.

[havocmom]

6. WE don't. The Corporations & brokers need it cuz they have shot their

wad already and are outta tricks to get investors. They have to have the US government hold wage earners so they can pick pockets.

Yep IT IS paying taxes to corporations. It's official: it's fascism, the merger of government & corporate interests.

[papau]

7. payroll deduction to encourage savings - Clinton also had a small match

in his Universal Savings Accounts/

The GOP only want to destroy "intergenerational dependence" - this weeks new buzz word -

meaning you can't trust your parents and you can't trust your kids and you can not trust anyone except yourself.

It is the GOP values thing.

[SharonAnn]

19. OK, then can I stop supporting schools? And county indigent

health care, especially for children? An parks and swimming pools and Little League teams and school bands and ??????

Wow, that would lower my property taxes by a little more than 50%.

And then when I can't drive can I stop paying for roads and transportation infrastructure?

[MercutioATC]

8. Shhhh! You're making sense. We'll have none of that!

Unless the "small portion" you'll be able to invest is actually a significant portion, it won't make much od a difference anyway, especially figuring in the reduced guaranteed benefits.

However, even a "small portion" multiplied by millions of workers represents quite a lot of fees that plan administrators can generate.


Hmmm....

[EVDebs]

12. Any 'portion' carved out of the present system DESTROYS SS eom

[MercutioATC]

18. Agreed. Especially because the portion involved won't make any

difference to most people. It's just another way to transfer money from the poor to the wealthy.

[marcologico]

9. To give Wall Street a piece of the action. Period. n/t

[cestpaspossible]

10. IRAs are private accounts

Social Security is a program to help seniors and others who can't work. As you point out, we already have private accounts where people can invest their own money if they want. This is just another tax cut designed to de-fund and destroy Social Security.

[chieftain]

11. Great Question .

Josh Marshall has a great post on his blog describing the basic difference between defined benefit plans such as Social Security and defined contibution plans such as 401k's and W's efforts to transform the former to the latter . He goes into some detail that any retirement plan should include both but absolutely has to have the guaranteed component of SocSec. It is lengthy but well worth the read .

[TexasSissy]

13. Unlike IRAs, this new thing will not be discretionary.

The "tax" will still be taken out of your paycheck by your employer. But you will have a choice for a small % of it to go to an SS-private account. If you choose not to do that, that % goes into SS, same as it does now.

Second, your investment options will be limited, in an effort to prevent you from taking too much risk.

Third, WHERE the account is housed will not be totally your choice. (Read that to mean....you will have no control over the fees charged your account.)

IRAs are discretionary. You can start an IRA in almost any financial institution. And you can invest in anything you want.

They are totally different in the above respects.

[cestpaspossible]

14. So, the proposal is not really for private accounts

but for a portion of your Social Security taxes to be invested on Wall Street.

[TexasSissy]

16. Yep. That's my understanding.

If you're wealthy, it should work fine. If you really need that $$$, well, it's not guaranteed, as under the present system. Maybe you'll end up with the same $$$, maybe more, maybe less.

[librechik]

15. Bush wants a legacy--Iraq war disaster isn't good enough for history

he wants to leave the presidency with some positive accomplishment that will make him as beloved as FDR.

What a moron.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

17. I heard my neighborhood coffee shop's token Republican explain it like

this: "We need to bring more money into the system. Private investments will do that. It's the only alternative to raising taxes." I tried to ask him what was wrong with raising taxes. According to him, it's really bad to raise taxes, and nobody pays those high rates anyway.

:wtf:

That's what I get for trying to argue with a Republican.

[SharonAnn]

20. How does taking money out of the system bring more into it?

[marcologico]

22. It's that I.O.U. voodoo that they do so well

a.k.a. Reaganomics.

[leesa]

21. We don't. Wall Street wants your money.