New Democrat Marshall: Democrats in "total denial" on Social Security

October 16, 2002

The Miami Herald quotes Will Marshall, head of the influential "New Democratic" Progressive Policy Institute blasting his own party's election-year tactics on Social Security reform. The Herald's Steven Thomma writes, "By 2017, benefits paid out will outstrip tax revenues coming in. By 2043, when today's 20-somethings start to retire, the trust fund will be gone and there will be enough taxes coming in to finance only 75 percent of current benefits. What would Democrats do about this? They don't say."

PPI's Marshall notes, "Any serious student of the issue knows it's irresponsible only to shoot down every idea for reform and not offer your own. Democrats are in total denial. They don't want to acknowledge the problem."

Thomma writes, "In the final weeks of this year's election campaign for control of Congress, voters around the country are hearing plenty about Social Security. The one thing they aren't hearing is what the two major political parties would do to fix the system."

The two major parties are uninterested in debating the real issues regarding Social Security, Thomma says, preferring instead to politicize the entire issue.

Thomma continues, "Democrats say this election is a referendum on Social Security. They complain that President Bush is jeopardizing the program; their national party website…even runs a cartoon ad showing him pushing people in wheelchairs down an incline to their apparent deaths. But they refuse to offer any long-term financial fixes, which actuaries say Social Security needs before baby boomer retirements start draining the nation's basic pension fund."

"Republicans, for their part, are fleeing Bush's proposal to allow younger workers to divert some of their Social Security taxes into private stock accounts. Spooked by plummeting stock markets, they prefer to wait until after the election to take up the issue."

"Yet because this campaign is devoid of details on what to do, it will be much more difficult for the parties to agree on fundamental changes to the system, even though most financial analysts agree that some will be needed soon."

Most Republicans aren't improving the debate, Thomma says. They remain hesitant to discuss the personal account plans put forth by the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security. Thomma writes of Republicans, "…they don't want to talk about the other option for shoring up the system -- privately managed accounts designed to supplement Social Security benefits."

This lack of substantive debate and action on Social Security does little to help fix the system's fundamental problems.

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