Reason and Radical

More on the Bush Boondoggle

You put some money into a "private account," and in return you get lower benefits. The feds actually own the account, though, and will pay you the benefits you would have gotten anyway under the system we already have — but only if the account does well. If the account does really well, you might get a bit of bonus cash. And the cost? Hard to say. But at least $4 or $5 trillion for a system that — even in the worst case — is only $3.7 trillion in the hole for the next 75 years.

Oh, and did we mention that participants are required to buy annuities instead of cashing out their accounts when they retire? So much for bequeathing your "personal account" to your kids in the event of your untimely demise.

What a Rube Goldberg monstrosity: layer upon layer of weird safeguards and limitations just to make sure that the new system can do what the current system already does, namely provide a guaranteed, stable retirement income for old people.

The worst part of the whole thing is how unnecessary it is.

posted by Leimodnu @ 2:36 PM