If, on the other hand, we’re going to get stuck with a tax increase rather than a benefit cut, then we’ll have to figure out some way to prevent that from happening. I’d like to see some way to do that without setting aside a huge pile of money that the Social Security Administration tells you how you’re allowed to invest.

Follow up: And if you don’t really own it, why engage the fiction of calling it a private or personal account? What is achieved by doing that?

Second point: Are personal accounts not socialism with a capitalist face? Let’s see: government ownership of with the pretense of worker control.
Sounds like socialism to me. I can’t wait till the special interests line up to lobby the trustee to change, say, labor policy at GM now that the SS administration votes 5% of the shares outstanding and has a seat on the board.

Philosophically, you draw a fundamental distinction between a “politician’s promise” and a “guarantee.” But even fee simple property rights are only as secure as the political consensus securing them. In other countries, this isn’t very secure. If there is a political consensus that diverting the SS trust fund and payroll tax revenues is as unthinkable as defaulting on the public debt, then that is all the security you can get in life.

The Democrats are trying to create that kind of consensus, and if they beat Bush on this, then that will be more than just a “politician’s promise.”

More practically, I, for one, have no objection to reducing the level of political discretion as long as it is combined with the defned benefit.

What about Brad De Long’s proposal to vest the trust fund in nonpartisan trustees, who can make benefit cuts if necessary to maintain actuarial soundness? Congress would precommit future payroll taxes, and what the general fund owes in debt repayment.

Philosophically, you draw a fundamental distinction between a “politician’s promise” and a “guarantee.” But even fee simple property rights are only as secure as the political consensus securing them. In other countries, this isn’t very secure. If there is a political consensus that diverting the SS trust fund and payroll tax revenues is as unthinkable as defaulting on the public debt, then that is all the security you can get in life.

The Democrats are trying to create that kind of consensus, and if they beat Bush on this, then that will be more than just a “politician’s promise.”

More practically, I, for one, have no objection to reducing the level of political discretion as long as it is combined with the defned benefit.

What about Brad De Long’s proposal to vest the trust fund in nonpartisan trustees, who can make benefit cuts if necessary to maintain actuarial soundness? Congress would precommit future payroll taxes, and what the general fund owes in debt repayment.

Follow up: And if you don’t really own it, why engage the fiction of calling it a private or personal account? What is achieved by doing that?

Second point: Are personal accounts not socialism with a capitalist face? Let’s see: government ownership of with the pretense of worker control.
Sounds like socialism to me. I can’t wait till the special interests line up to lobby the trustee to change, say, labor policy at GM now that the SS administration votes 5% of the shares outstanding and has a seat on the board.

If, on the other hand, we’re going to get stuck with a tax increase rather than a benefit cut, then we’ll have to figure out some way to prevent that from happening. I’d like to see some way to do that without setting aside a huge pile of money that the Social Security Administration tells you how you’re allowed to invest.