Reading Between the Lies: Report #9
By Hans Riemer, Senior Policy Analyst
10/4/02 | PDF
NEW GROUP HAS SOCIAL SECURITY PLEDGE...FOR PRIVATIZATION
Backfire: Pledge will expose candidates who claim that privatization is different from private accounts
It was just a matter of time. A new coalition of right-wing groups, called "Social Security Choice.Org," is calling on candidates to sign the "Pledge to Save, Strengthen, and Modernize Social Security."
But this pledge does not commit candidates to saving Social Security at all. This Pledge commits candidates to privatization. The pledge reads: “I pledge to support allowing younger workers the option to voluntarily place a portion of their Social Security taxes in personal retirement accounts.”
Of course, when some workers take their money out of Social Security for private investments, guaranteed benefits have to go down for everyone.
This new phony pledge is being pushed in response to the Campaign for America’s Future “Pledge to Protect Social Security and Medicare,” which specifically commits candidates to oppose any plan that uses Social Security money for private investments. Grassroots groups across the country are forcing the debate, and they have the privatizers on the run.
The members of the Social Security Choice.Org coalition – Citizens for a Sound Economy, Americans for Tax Reform, 60 Plus, and the National Taxpayers Union – are the same right-wing extremist groups that have hijacked the debate about Social Security by pushing privatization – and now want reporters to stop using the word.
At the very least, this pledge will be a Charlatan’s Award for any candidate who claims to "oppose privatization but support private accounts." How can they claim to “oppose privatization” when they have signed a Social Security pledge by organizations that advocate privatization? As the following quotes demonstrate, these groups have clearly advocated Social Security “privatization.”
Note: if any link suddenly “stops working” or if the word “privatization” is suddenly replaced by “modernization,” contact us for a hardcopy.
CITIZENS FOR A SOUND ECONOMY
"Thankfully, a viable alternative exists in the form of partial Social Security privatization, which would allow workers to invest a portion of their payroll taxes in a wide array of financial instruments or interest-bearing accounts. These investments would be the property of the beneficiary and stored in regulated private accounts that would be required to be broadly diversified."
CSE release, 02/05/02
AMERICANS FOR TAX REFORM
"Soical Security Privatization Good for Taxpayers, the Economy, the World; Privatization would provide trillions in new investment capital for U.S. world markets."
ATR Press Release, 10/30/00
60 PLUS
"At a fourth forum on Saving Social Security sponsored by the 60 Plus Association, a nonpartisan senior citizens advocacy group with 500,000 members, Association President Jim Martin declared partial privatization of the retirement system "the wave of the future", as Social Security turned 65 years old."
60 Plus press release, 8/14/00
NATIONAL TAXPAYERS UNION
"Yet, America needn't rely on hypothetical situations or comparisons to similar plans to prove the worth of privatizing Social Security. In fact, countries throughout the world are in the process of privatizing their social security plans. Those that have completed the transition are currently reaping the benefits of privatization."
NTU Policy Paper # 110, 04/07/99
The Campaign for America's Future (www.ourfuture.org) is putting the spotlight on misleading campaign messages. As supporters of privatization try to spin their way out of a fair debate over the consequences of their ideas, the Campaign for America’s Future’s “Truth Squad” will expose the misrepresentations and lies. For more information, contact Hans Riemer with the Campaign for America’s Future at (202) 955-5665 or riemer@ourfuture.org.
For more information about Social Security visit our Social Security Superpage.
