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Sunday, September 17, 2000
By Ann McFeatters, Post-Gazette National Bureau
Neither Ralph Nader, the Green Party presidential candidate, nor Pat Buchanan, the Reform Party nominee, has put out a detailed plan to reform Social Security or Medicare. But both men have definite thoughts on retirement issues.
Nader is vehemently opposed to privatizing Social Security. He argues that, first and foremost, Social Security "places government in one of its noblest roles: Provision of a bedrock guarantee to all members of society that you do not need to fear the financial consequences of growing old or disabled, for society will assure you with an income stream to enable you to meet your basic needs."
Adding the risk or, as he sees it, the "certainty" of fraud to that equation should workers be called upon to invest some portion of their payroll taxes on their own to assure retirement assets, is a bad idea, Nader says.
"What would happen if the market crashed, and people suddenly saw the source of 30 percent of their retirement income stream wiped away? What happens to the individual who bets his retirement nest egg on the success of eight-track tapes or Beta videotaping systems?"
Any federal budget surpluses, Nader argues, should be used to close the Medicare funding gap expected to happen when baby boomers start retiring in a decade.
Buchanan says retirees must be guaranteed "every penny promised under the current system." He wants every cent of payroll taxes dedicated toward Social Security saved only for that purpose, not spent to reduce the federal debt, as Gore proposes.
But Buchanan likes Bush's idea of letting workers invest.
If elected, he says, he would "work with Congress to develop a pay-as-you-go Social Security plan that will secure the system while allowing American workers to begin building personal retirement accounts."