The Same Old Saw On Social Security

The Same Old Saw On Social Security:

By Charles Krauthammer

Friday, May 6, 2005; Page A23

Having lured the president out onto a far limb on Social Security, the Democrats have begun sawing. Democratic leaders immediately rejected the president's plan and stood up for all that is good and true and saintedly Rooseveltian -- without, of course, offering any alternative.

To be sure, the president started all this on his own, first proposing personal accounts. Democrats objected that this did nothing about the really important issue, namely solvency. So Bush offered five solvency alternatives in his State of the Union address (four first proposed by Democrats) and welcomed any other ideas. The Democrats answered: 'You go first.' On April 28 the president did go first, proposing a remarkably progressive reduction in the rate of growth of benefits.


The Democratic leadership, supported by misleading headlines around the country, denounced these 'cuts' as the work of a party that never did believe in Social Security and now wants to kill it.

Yes, these are cuts, but only in the growth of promised benefits in the future -- based on formulas written in the pre-baby boomer retirement era that so inflate benefits that they are entirely unsustainable. They cannot possibly be paid by the taxes of the fewer workers in the future who will be supporting the many retirees."

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