Social Security: The Poison Pill

President Bush's 2007 budget proposal includes funding for a Social Security privatization plan.

"His plan would let people set up private accounts starting in 2010 and would divert more than $700 billion of Social Security tax revenues to pay for them over the first seven years. ... Unlike Bush's generalized privatization talk of last year, we're now talking detailed numbers. On page 321 of the budget proposal, you see the privatization costs: $24.182 billion in fiscal 2010, $57.429 billion in fiscal 2011 and another $630.533 billion for the five years after that, for a seven-year total of $712.144 billion." - Newsweek

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11235990/site/newsweek/

Something else I found interesting:

"Bush also wants to change the way Social Security benefits are calculated for most people by adopting so-called progressive indexing. Lower-income people would continue to have their Social Security benefits tied to wages, but the benefits paid to higher-paid people would be tied to inflation.

"Wages have typically risen 1.1 percent a year more than inflation, so over time, that disparity would give lower-paid and higher-paid people essentially the same benefit. However, higher-paid workers would be paying substantially more into the system than lower-paid people would."
What this doesn't say is that wages are something that can be kept under control by the corporate libertarians, while inflation is out of their control. And the minimum wage is something the Conservatives want to eliminate so they can pay people even lower wages. And don't forget that the coming financial situation thanks to $8 Trillion in deficits will raise inflation, thereby giving higher-paid people a steady increase in benefits while leaving our grandparents and the poor out on the street. Maybe a better plan would be to tie lower-wage benefits to the cost of living, while tying higher-wage benefits to the minimum wage. That would be an incentive for future administrations to raise the minimum wage.

The Conservatives want that $712 Billion for Wall Street. And this plan in the budget bill is their poison pill for the American people. So it's time to introduce our own poison pill.

I'm making a pledge right now that every dollar that I can spare will be going towards private investment into stocks that pay a high dividend, like Haliburton and GM. Half of those dividend checks that I get back will be going to progressive think tanks like the Center for American Progress or the Institute for Washington's Future. The other half of those dividends will be reinvested back into the stocks it came from, giving me a growing collection of stocks. This is basically what they've been doing for 30+ years in support of the Heritage Foundation and 80 other thinktanks that push their schemes to destroy this country.

So, for example, if I invest in WalMart stock, half of the dividend will go to Wake Up Walmart. If I purchase GM or Ford, half will be going to the United Auto Workers. If I buy ExxonMobil, half will be going to the Sierra Club or Greenpeace. If I buy News Corp, half of the dividend will be going to Media Matters for America.

That's my poison pill that I'm shoving down the throat of the corporate libertarians. The more money they are able to steal from public money to go into private hands, the bigger the stock dividends will be, and the more money I'll be able to make available to build a strong progressive infrastructure. And I invite everyone who can afford $10 per month to join me.

It's time to fight back, with every tool at our disposal. They have designed the global financial system to make them money. It's time we took some of that money back and put it towards a positive future.