By Anne Kass
I can’t help but think of our trip to Chile last year where we learned that Milton Friedman and his Chicago Boys helped Pinochet sack the Chilean Social Security System which was similar to ours–employer and employee contributions with defined benefit payout.
What they did–and I think they may even have put this into their new constitution–was to terminate the employer contribution, continue the mandatory employee contribution, turn the stream of money over to hedge fund operators to “invest” without restraint or regulation, and end the defined benefit payout for everyone except the military–who also kept the employer contribution part. All others just get a pension benefit from money that may be available when they retire. Sweet, huh?
Conservatives have long wanted to do something similar to Social Security System here. Hide and watch while the propaganda starts that our Social Security plan is stealing from young workers today and will be bankrupt when they will be eligible to retire, and that the excess funds are drawing low interest and would do better in that magic “market”… I think this narrative is well on the way to being accepted truth.
I keep thinking that there’s nothing so bad it can’t get worse.
