The AARP started this campaign a few months ago called "You've Earned A Say." Sounds good, right? It's about "protecting" Social Security and Medicare. The thing is, when powerful interests say "protecting," they're really saying, "This is going to hurt you a lot more than it hurts me."

If you're still not clear on what the Very Serious People are proposing to do, read this. It spells it out rather nicely. Then email it to all your friends.

Now, look at this lovely little survey of their members they're conducting. I wonder if it was subsidized by our old friend Pete Peterson, because the questions are so carefully slanted to get the less-careful readers to say what they want them to say. (I can just hear the news bobbleheads now: "A new survey of AARP membership shows that 87% demand immediate action on Social Security and Medicare.")

I think you all know what to do, right? Click that "Speak Up Now!" button!

Social Security

1. Social Security is the largest source of income for most current retirees. For others, Social Security is just one source of retirement income along with pensions, savings and investments. Thinking about future retirees, which do you agree with more?

• Social Security is too important to consider benefit changes for future retirees.

• We need a balanced approach of benefit and revenue changes to make sure Social Security is there for future retirees.

• The Social Security system is so broken that it should be completely changed for future retirees.

Of course, only really stupid people would pick the first answer, right? Because there's a crisis, damn it, and the AARP has insurance policies to sell!

2. According to the Social Security Trustees, Social Security will be able to pay all benefits for about 25 years and three-quarters of promised benefits after that time. In order to ensure all benefits can be paid, they say that changes can be made now or larger changes can be made later. When do you think changes should be made?

• Major changes should be made now.

• Some changes should be made now, but we should wait before making any major changes.

• We should wait a few years before making changes.

• No changes should be made.

Continue reading »

Washington, DC - Last week we witnessed the capo di tutti capi of political and policy evolution. President Barack Obama, after Vice-President Joe Biden and Education Secretary Arne Duncan played the role of his social-issue Shofar, came out in favour of the equality of marriage for all in the US, regardless of sexual orientation. To put it in simple terms: for the first time in the history of this country, the president of the United States supports gay marriage.

This is obviously a big moment. For those seeking to enter loving relationships recognised by law, nothing has changed in that realm. But culturally, when the president or other major political figures make strong statements on issues, it changes everything. To quote Republican House Leader Shelley Runyon in the film The Contender: "What I say, the American people will believe. And do you know why? Because I will have a very big microphone in front of me."

This rhetorical power is why a concomitant devolution by many in the Democratic Party, in protecting one of the two or three most important programs of the past century, the creation of social security, is so disturbing.

During the 2011 debate over the cliched "Grand Bargain", when right-wing Congressman were doing their darndest to moonwalk this country into financial default, perhaps just as frightening is what Democrats were willing to put on the table to appease the economic Morlocks. Namely, Medicare and the aforementioned social security (an issue that I work on), the latter so successful and politically powerful that it was responsible for taking millions of seniors (and children) out of poverty and helping cement an economically populist coalition within the Democratic Party that lasted a half century.

Why would Democrats be willing to touch this program, the crown jewel of progressive accomplishment, to deal with people who don't believe in compromise and have been trying to destroy the programme for decades? Likely, because too many Democrats have done their own evolving into a form of species known as Midcenturia Republicanus. Or Washington GOPers from the 1930s-1970s, who went along to get along, tried to always seem more "reasonable" than Democrats and, most importantly, remained a loveable minority in the halls of Congress.

Today, the consensus is rigged in the other direction. As Trudy Lieberman pointed out in her great piece in The Columbia Journalism Review:

"For nearly three years CJR has observed that much of the press has reported only one side of this story using 'facts' that are misleading, or flat-out wrong, while ignoring others ... news outlets have given the public a skewed picture of the financial health of this hugely important programme, which is the sole source of retirement funds for millions of Americans and will continue to be for decades to come."

When President Obama seems willing to talk about cutting social security, House Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi refuses to rule it out and Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer seems like a lion on the Serengeti eyeing a gazelle, this just sends a signal that it is OK for others to go even further - which bodes very badly for the future.

As Lieberman goes on to say, "the program can pay full benefits until 2036, and three-quarters of the benefits after that without new revenues. Many experts believe small fixes like lifting the cap on income subject to payroll taxes - $110,100 for 2012 - will make Social Security solvent for decades. But that option is not on Washington’s table, nor has it been discussed much in the press".

Why not?

Then there are ideas such as trimming the bloated, out-of-control defence budget, or allowing the US government to bulk negotiate for lower-priced prescription drugs for Medicare (like virtually every other post-industrial nation does) - or not imprisoning a larger share of our population, per capita, than Ming The Merciless.

Save billions on these wastes of funds and human potential, sprinkle some taxes on Kimye and poof. No deficit.

Yup, I hate to ruin it for any adrenaline junkies reading this, but not only is there no deficit crisis, but there are myriad ways to cure any minor ills without defenestrating social security, a programme that protects the 99 per cent of us - or one that you could say is more streetcar than car elevator. Additionally, recent elections in France and Greece reminded their elites that austerity is not only completely unnecessary and economically ahistorical, but ridiculously unpopular. Even 76 per cent of self described Tea Partiers - or people who think Christian rock is cool and lipids are a food group - don't want anyone touching their social security. Clear enough?

The United States has only two major parties, but nobody can make voters who are unenthusiastic trudge on over to their local polling place this November. Democrats need to stand up and protect social security, because it is the right thing to do, because there is simply no reason to cut it and because it shows strength politically (especially to those older voters who might not like the gay marriage decision). In other words, when it comes to social security: re-evolve already!

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Well, this is disturbing. There really is no hope for the future of the GOP, if this is the third rail they've decided to dance upon.

Not only in the video above, but on his own website, Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee claims that the payroll tax holiday turns Social Security into a welfare system. He says that payroll tax holidays undermine the funding of the Social Security Trust Fund, and therefore turn the program into welfare.

But let's be clear, this is not about funding Social Security. If the Congress really wanted to increase funding for Social Security, they would, as soon as the recession is over, do away with the cap on Social Security taxes and be done.

This is about associating "Social Security" with "welfare." Pure Frank Luntz mendacity.

And Senator Tom Coburn is attempting to do the same thing with unemployment, by claiming that millionaires should not be receiving those "benefits." "Direct handouts for millionaires have included $74 million in unemployment checks." Handouts? Really?

Sounds good to slam the rich in every event, right? The razor in the apple of that article is needs-testing unemployment INSURANCE and PENSIONS. Those are items that even millionaires paid for and deserve.

If you're a millionaire and lose your job, you are still entitled to collect on your unemployment insurance, because you paid into it and you have LOST that income due to job loss. That is INSURANCE that you paid for, not welfare.

Newt Gingrich needs to be slapped with that two-by-four of fact as well. Sorry, Newt, it's not welfare to be on unemployment. You are collecting on insurance, just as if you got rear-ended by another car. You pay into unemployment insurance just in case the economy rear-ends your job. You don't have to go work for it, jump through massive hoops (except prove you're looking for work) or feel as if you are a welfare case in order to get it. You paid for insurance. If you make it needs tested, no wealthy individual is going to agree to pay for insurance they are forbidden from collecting if they lose their job.

Retirement benefits and Social Security are the same and moreso. It's baloney to say that JUST because someone is rich, they shouldn't get the pension they worked for and are entitled to.

This is a very obvious slippery slope to needs-testing Social Security. Which means the end of the program.

Once those basic social safety-nets, (paid for by the recipients!), are taken away from the upper classes, they CEASE to have a constituency that is worth one rat's ass in the Congress. Poor people do not have lobbyists. And the big reason the New Deal included the upper classes was to give to that program a voting and influential constituency of EVERY American. That is what makes any cuts to Social Security an absolute third rail in American Politics. A third rail these Republicans are now dancing upon. Do they think we won't notice?

The Washington Post ran a startling story on their front page yesterday that would scare the crap out of most people -- if you didn't already understand how Social Security actually works, and that the Village elites will say just about anything to destroy it under the guise of "saving" it. Rich Eskow did a great job pulling it apart in this scathing HuffPost piece (you should go read it all):

If we had the space we'd deconstruct the entire piece. Instead we'll use a selected sample, beginning with the first line:

" Last year, as a debate over the runaway national debt gathered steam in Washington, Social Security passed a treacherous milestone. It went "cash negative."

Holy cow, that's a lot of deception in one sentence. First, the sentence conflates the national debt with Social Security. But Social Security is expressly forbidden by law from contributing to the debt! It must be entirely self-sustaining. So why connect the two in one sentence?

And that "treacherous milestone" isn't not treacherous at all. The plan's huge surplus, currently $2.6 trillion, was amassed because planners know that baby boomers would retire someday. That supposedly "treacherous" switch to "cash negative" has been anticipated for decades.

"Now, Social Security is sucking money out of the Treasury. This year, it will add a projected $46 billion to the nation's budget problems, according to projections by system trustees."

No. Social Security is entirely self-funded. This is a falsehood. And note the use of the word "sucking."

"Replacing cash lost to a one-year payroll tax holiday will require another $105 billion."

The President and Congress agreed to use the payroll taxes that fund Social Security as the mechanism for a tax break. That was a bad idea, in my opinion, precisely because it opened the program up to this kind of deception. But it's misleading at best to complain that this is adding to the nation's budget woes.

"Lawmakers in both parties are ducking the issue, wary of agitating older voters and their advocates in Washington, who have long targeted politicians who try to tamper with federal retirement benefits."

The word "ducking" is straight out of the Pete Peterson playbook. If you're not willing to back unnecessary cuts to Social Security to please billionaire political patrons like Peterson, you're somehow a cowardly politician.

Another Peterson trick is to ignore disabled recipients of Social Security and focus on the elderly, painting them as demanding, selfish, and cruel for expecting the benefits they'd paid for all their working lives. (Remember Alan Simpson's "greedy geezers" remark?) In Montgomery's case, these aggressive oldsters are "agitated" and have a practice of "targeting politicians" who cross them.

Continue reading »

The Washington Post is capable of some great investigative reporting, but for the most part, its editorial view reflects that of the Beltway media elites. You've seen their hunger to destroy the working class by the constant use of their pet phrase, "shared sacrifice,' and their love of economical austerity. You're not convinced? Their latest hit piece on Social Security calls it "cash negative". Not sure how that's possible with a $2.7 trillion in assets. Just read Dean Baker take these Villagers down.

Washington Post Discards All Journalistic Standards In Attack on Social Security.

News outlets generally like to claim a separation between their editorial pages and their news pages. The Washington Post has long ignored this distinction in pursuing its agenda for cutting Social Security, however it took a big step further in tearing this barrier in a business section story that would have been excluded from most opinion pages because of all the inaccuracies it contained...read on

And Duncan finds that they have an opening for a new ombudsman. Didn't one of their last executive editors declare that they needed to cover Glenn Beck and movement conservatives more closely because their reporting is so awesome? Yes, and he was backed up by an ombudsman too.

For a few weeks last fall, editors and ombudsmen at The Washington Post and New York Times seemed obsessed with the idea that they should be paying more attention to right-wing media and websites. In the wake of some wildly hyperbolic claims about ACORN, the nation's leading news outlets apologized for being too slow to run chasing after every "scandal" ginned up by Andrew Breitbart, Glenn Beck, and their ilk.

Washington Post executive editor Marcus Brauchli worried "that we are not well-enough informed about conservative issues. It's particularly a problem in a town so dominated by Democrats and the Democratic point of view" -- a concern echoed by his deputies and Post ombudsman Andrew Alexander.

Alexander gives us a detailed account as to why the WaPo is so slow to cover conservative conspiracies issues.
Still not swayed? Just take a look at the amount of MSM coverage was given to the bogus conservative lie about the $16 muffin.

Here's the problem with extending the payroll tax cuts: They're unlikely to ever be restored. And if they're not restored, you've done what Republicans have been trying to do for decades: turned Social Security into a welfare program that no longer pays for itself, but comes out of the general fund and for the first time, adds to the deficit.

So when you hear people saying it's a good idea for the economy, they're right -- for the short term. It's additional stimulus at a time when it's badly needed. But for the long run, it will politically undermine the long-term future of Social Security -- which the administration probably considers a feature, and not a bug:

The President asked for a $175 billion one-year extension and expansion of the employee payroll tax holiday now in place, halving the tax rate to 3.1 percent in 2012. He also proposed halving employer payroll taxes to 3.1 percent for the first $5 million of payrolls in 2012. The president also wants a complete payroll tax holiday that would apply when companies grew their payrolls by up to $50 million in a year by hiring new workers or raising the salaries of existing workers.These cuts in the Federal Insurance Contributions Act tax (FICA) may be one of the best available stimulus options in the current political climate, and they will have a positive economic impact.

Ananalysis by The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities notes that the cuts already in place make a substantial difference in the spending power of middle class families, and that allowing them to expire at this time would be very negative for growth:

Failure by Congress to extend the temporary payroll tax cut enacted last December would reduce all paychecks starting on January 1, withdrawing needed support from the still-weak economy. The measure, part of the tax cut-unemployment insurance deal between President Obama and Republican leaders, reduces the employee share of the Social Security payroll tax,[1] boosting workers’ take-home pay by an estimated $120 billion in 2011. The tax cut is worth $934 to the average worker.

And Moody’s Analytics estimates that allowing the payroll tax cuts to expire would reduce GDP growth by one percentage point in 2012, translating into one million fewer jobs by the end of next year.

But Social Security advocates worry that these temporary payroll tax cuts will never be restored. “The problem is, it is very easy in our current political climate to cut revenue and very hard to increase it,” says Nancy Altman, co-director of the Strengthen Social Security coalition and author of The Battle for Social Security, an excellent history of the program and its politics.

“Look at the controversy over ending the Bush tax cuts, which would only affect a small portion of taxpayers,” Altman says. “In this case, if you propose restoring the payroll tax down the road, you’d have to double the rates on workers making minimum wage. This is being sold as temporary, but it’s not likely to work out that way.”

Today is National Social Security Call-In Day. Call your Senators today to tell them not to touch it, please. Via Campaign for America's Future:

The following is from the Strengthen Social Security coalition, of which Campaign for America's Future is part:

We need you to call your Senators and demand that they vote for the Sanders/Reid Social Security Protection Amendment.

Senator Sanders and Majority Leader Reid are leading the fight in the Senate to protect Social Security from drastic cuts.

Their amendment simply says:

Social Security benefits for current and future beneficiaries should not be cut and Social Security should not be privatized as part of any legislation to reduce the Federal deficit.

Call your Senators RIGHT NOW at 1-866-251-4044. You’ll be given a choice of which of your state’s two senators to be connected with. Call BOTH of your senators if you have the time. It only takes a minute each.

Tell the person who answers the phone:

• I am a voter/constituent living in [your state]. I am calling to tell the Senator:
• I oppose all cuts to Social Security and
• I urge them to vote yes on the Sanders/Reid Social Security Protection Amendment.
• Please take the time for this very important effort today. This is for all of us who depend on Social Security.

Call Today: 1-866-251-4044.

AFTER YOU CALL:

Stay involved, the threat to Social Security continues. Please click to stay involved in the fight.

Thank you!

With the Tea Party right and Boehner pushing for more budget cuts and are in talks with Daley, how safe do you think Social Security is going to be?

Matt Yglesias says if there are going to be cuts to Social Security, they should happen right away to everyone, including current recipients. And I have to admit, he has a point.

Because the "of course we'll exempt everyone 55 and older" from getting their promised benefits is just how the politicians on both sides of the aisle are covering their asses as they toil away for the banker class, and maybe it's time those shiny pink butts should be exposed to the light.

Not to mention, this is classic "divide and conquer" strategy. We should stick together. We should present a united front. You want to cut Social Security? Then you need to face the universal wrath of the voters in the next election, instead of putting some of us in a protected class. (Of course, it's a rather desirable side effect that if we do present a united front, the chances of actual Social Security cuts drop precipitously.)

This could be our Egypt moment. Just as Christians surrounded the Muslims at prayer, we should surround the younger generation with our promise that if they try to take their future Social Security, they'll have to go through us first.

You cut one, you cut us all. How about it?

Progressive economist Dean Baker is the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, and he keeps pointing something out that seems to slip past the tiny minds of the corporate media:

This would have been an appropriate headline for an AP article which included a quote from North Dakota Senator Kent Conrad implying that it would be reasonable to default on the government bonds held by the Social Security trust fund:

"I've received the lash from those who say, 'Well, you shouldn't have to cut Social Security because there are trillions of dollars of assets.' It is true there are trillions of dollars of assets. It is true that they're backed by the full faith and credit of the United States. It is also true that the only way those bonds get redeemed is out of the current income of the United States."

This assertion is true of all government bonds, however Mr. Conrad is clearly suggesting that it would for some reason be appropriate not to honor the bonds held by the Social Security trust fund. It is unusual for a prominent senator to suggest defaulting on the national debt. This fact should have been the central focus of the article.

Yep. If we're in such bad shape that we default on our debts, we have much bigger problems than paying for Social Security.

Should we cut Social Security to "save" it from cuts?

Just two days after the President pledged during the State of the Union address to improve Social Security "without putting at risk current retirees" and "without slashing benefits for future generations" the program is again being subjected to widespread, misleading attacks in the media.

With the headline Social Security fund will be drained by 2037, AP ran a (since-changed, original is still available here. It is worth comparing the original with the revised.) op-ed story that began,

Sick and getting sicker, Social Security will run at a deficit this year and keep on running in the red until its trust funds are drained by about 2037, congressional budget experts said Wednesday in bleaker-than-previous estimates.

"Drained?"

The CBO story about Social Security is part of a larger overall budget deficit projection, the result of the recent vote to give more tax cuts to the wealthy. The AP story, widely echoed in the media, is instead focusing only on Social Security. But it is not "news" that the trust fund will be exhausted in 2037 (assuming continuing poor economic and wage growth -- read this and everything Bruce Webb writes about Social Security at Angry Bear), it is the projection that had been understood for years. However, using better economic assumptions that could result from policies that increase the wages of working people and reduce the concentration of wealth the trust fund does not run out at all.

Even so, in 2037, under these bad-case scenarios, Social Security will still be able to pay 78% of projected benefits, which are higher than today's benefits. So in this poor-case scenario, if nothing is done, recipients will face a cut of 22%.

Saying that we need to cut Social Security now because it might -- might -- have to be cut 22% in 2037 is saying we need to cut it to "save" it from cuts.

Deficit Commission Recommendations?

The AP story wrongly stated that the "Deficit Commission" had made recommendations to increase the retirement age and cut the program through reduced cost-of-living increases. In fact the commission was unable to agree on any recommendations.

A debt commission appointed by President Barack Obama has recommended a series of changes to improve Social Security's finances, including a gradual increase in the full retirement age, lower cost-of-living increases and a gradual increase in the threshold on the amount of income subject to the Social Security payroll tax.

Obama, however, has not embraced any of the panel's recommendations. Instead, in his State of the Union speech this week, he called for unspecified bipartisan solutions to strengthen the program while protecting current retirees, future retirees and people with disabilities.

Experts?

To assist with its anti-Social Security formulation the AP story claimed "experts" (plural) are calling for "reform" by quoting one "expert" (singular) from the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute.

Running A Deficit?

Conservative outlets are expanding on the CBO report, claiming that Social Security is running deficits -- as long as you don't cont the interest that the program's bonds earn. For example, note the use of the word "effectively" in CNS' CBO: Social Security to Run $45 Billion Deficit in 2011

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reports that Social Security will effectively run a $45-billion deficit in 2011 and continue to run deficits totaling $547 billion over the coming decade.

National Review, uses the word "broke" in CBO: Social Security Now Officially Broke, and claims the interest is only "camouflage,"

Today’s CBO report has some bad news about the deficit. But CBO has some really, really bad news about Social Security: It’s officially broke.

... But there’s a bit of camouflage attached: If you include the “interest” that the federal government “owes” the fictitious Social Security “trust fund,” then the program is in the black.

And so on...

Cut The Program To Save It From Cuts?

So does it make sense to cut the program to save it from cuts? The real agenda behind calls for cuts is so that the money does not have to be found elsewhere to repay the trust fund. The trust fund masked the harm done by tax cuts, and undoing tax cuts is what will be needed to pay back the money that working people have set aside for retirement,

Claiming that Social Security needs to be cut, or the retirement age raised, so that Social Security needs less funding is like your bank telling you that you need to cut back on food so they won't have to pay you back the money you put into a savings account.

Update - As this was posted AP released an astonishing new attack, Social Security posting $600B deficit over 10 years. Ignoring the program's huge trust fund and that there is no deficit at all when interest paid to that trust fund is counted, AP writes,

Social Security will post nearly $600 billion in deficits over the next decade as the economy struggles to recover and millions of baby boomers stand at the brink of retirement, according to new congressional projections.

This year alone, Social Security is projected to collect $45 billion less in payroll taxes than it pays out in retirement, disability and survivor benefits, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. That figure swells to $130 billion when a new one-year cut in payroll taxes is included, though Congress has promised to repay any lost revenue from the tax cut.

. . . But the new projections show nothing but red ink until the Social Security trust funds are exhausted in 2037.

This post originally appeared at Campaign for America's Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF.