Workers Independent News - Social Security

Income Inequality Is Negatively Impacting Social Security - 04/25/07

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 15:51:39 -0700

By Doug Cunningham

Center for Economic and Policy research economist Dean Baker says long-term challenges facing Social Security have been made worse by the upward distribution of income. The share of payroll that’s taxed for Social Security is dropping – from 90 percent in 1983 to just 83.2 percent now. That’s because more money is being paid to people above the $97,500 per year income cutoff for paying social security taxes.

Bush Puts Social Security Privatization in the 2007 Budget - 02/10/06

Thu, 09 Feb 2006 15:29:41 -0800

By Doug Cunningham

Despite intense public opposition to the idea of undermining Social Security by privatizing it, George W. Bush has included social security privatization in the 2007 federal budget. The budget includes more than $700 billion to pay for setting up Socia Security private accounts. The accounts would begin in 2010. The Bush plan would siphon money out of the existing Social Security system to allow private accounts, investing the money in the stock market. When Bush attempted to sell Americans on his privatization plan it was clearly rejected by the majority of the American people. Organized labor led a vigorous campaign against it. Bush has quietly slipped it in the 2007 budget now before Congress.

AFL-CIO's Trumka says corporate mismanagement has caused pension crisis - 06/22/05

Tue, 21 Jun 2005 18:30:38 -0700

AFL-CIO Secretary Treasurer Rich Trumka told workers at a rally in New York City recently that as corporations continue their attack on pensions politicians need to understand the real problem.

[Rich Trumka 1] : "Make no mistake about it. Pensions are not the problem. The problem is corporate mismanagement. The problem is corporate accounting tricks. The problem is corporate greed and it's time that we stood up and put an end to it, startin' on Wall Street and then spread across this country!"

Trumka says labor is lobbying for reform of the federal agency that insures pensions, the Pension Benefits Guaranty Corporation, in a way that helps workers save their pensions. But he says the most powerful tool labor has is mass mobilization to defend pensions and social security.

EPI finds more people depending on social security

Thu, 26 May 2005 13:23:47 -0700

Economists at the Economic Policy Institute have released a study saying that reliance on Social Security is growing. Christian Weller and Edward N. Wolff authored the study "Retirement Income: The Crucial Role of Social Security." Wolff said there are many factors to consider when looking at Social Security:

[Wolff]: We need to keep in mind that we both need to address the short falls in the private pension sector as well as Social Security solvency.

The study says "middle-income households headed by someone between the ages of 56-64 retirement preparedness improved by nearly 30 percent between 1989 and 2001." The reason cited by Wolff and Weller was that Social Security wealth grew by $77,600 - that's more then the growth of private pensions and other wealth combined.

EPI: Economic policy, not demographics, is driving what's happening to the social security fund

Tue, 26 Apr 2005 06:59:10 -0700

A new report released this morning by the Economic Policy Institute suggests that economic policy has created the Social Security shortfall, not changing demographics.

[Josh Bivens]: Inequality, high wage earners seeing much bigger raises than everyone else is leading to this erosion in the tax base of social security.

Workers protest Charles Schwab role in pushing Social Security privatization

Fri, 01 Apr 2005 16:48:21 -0800

Workers in dozens of cities around the nation demonstrated in front of the offices of Wall Street brokerage Charles Schwab and similar firms to protest the privatization of Social Security. Charles Schwab is part of a business coalition spending millions of dollars to push for privatization of social security because those firms stand to make billions if privatization happens. Sue Stawicki is a union worker who doesn¹t believe for a minute that George W. Bush is really trying to save social security by privatizing it.

[Sue Stawicki]: "No, he's out to give it off to Wall Street and stuff and to investors. It ain't gonna help us. Look at Enron and their savings. We've had depressions, we had stock market crashes. I don't wanna put my money into something there's no insurance."

Labor holds national day of action on social security

Thu, 31 Mar 2005 07:03:57 -0800

Working people across the country concerned about the future of Social Security will be holding rallies throughout the country today. The rallies will be led by labor unions, working families and other organizations, such as the AARP, in front of Wall Street firms that have expressed support for the Bush administrations plans to privatize Social Security. These groups have expressed concern that the plan could inflate the federal debt by $5 trillion dollars and would weaken retirement security. One of the primary targets in most cities is Charles Schwab, one of the major backers of the push to privatize.

Anti-Social Security privatization messages carried across country

Mon, 28 Mar 2005 08:49:12 -0800

The Alliance for Retired Americans is carrying one million messages against social security privatization through 20 congressional districts. At every stop along the way local senior citizen’s will take the “Don’t Privatize Social Security” petitions to local offices of members of Congress. The trip opposing social security privatization ends April 1st in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The petitions are being carried on a flatbed truck and will have traveled 3,000 miles by April 1st. Stops include Fort Lauderdale, Florida, North Carolina, Indiana, Ohio, New York and Pennsylvania. The Alliance for Retired Americans is a grassroots group representing more than three million seniors and retirees. The group’s president, George Kourpias says seniors can’t trust anyone who claims social security benefits are safe under privatization. He says the fight is to preserve social security for all generations, including the grandchildren of today’s seniors.

Economist says social security pales in comparison to the federal budget deficit

Fri, 25 Mar 2005 08:54:35 -0800

Bush administration officials have pounced on a recent report from the Social Security trustees that predicts problems in the program starting in 2017. But according to Max Sawicky, an economist for the Economic Policy Institute, the supposed problem with Social Security pales when compared budget deficit created by the administration's tax cuts.

[Sawicky1]: The overwhelmingly major factor in deficits currently and in the long-term is the tax cuts enacted since 2000.

Unions pressure big-business in effort to stop social security privatization

Wed, 09 Mar 2005 13:09:27 -0800

Two major unions have begun using their leverage to encourage corporations to not support plans to privatize Social Security. The American Federation of County and Municipal Employees as well as the Laborers International Union have written to executives at Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab and others telling them if they support President Bush's plan they may lose their business. AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee has gone a step further and asked the CEO of Pfizer to withdraw membership from the Alliance for Worker Retirement Security. According to the Laura Miller, editor at the Center for Media and Democracy as well as a WIN contributor, the Alliance is a business coalition formed to promote privatization of Social Security.

[Miller]: The Alliance also has close ties to the Bush White House as it's former executive director now is the special assistant on Social Security at the White House and one of the chief architects of the Bush Social Security plan at the National Economic Council.

The Department of Labor suppresses an article critical of Bush's Social Security plan

Fri, 18 Feb 2005 09:00:33 -0800

The Department of Labor is trying to block distribution of a newsletter it distributes as part of a contract with the National Council of Field Labor Locals because it contains a column criticial of Bush's plan to privatize social security. The newsletter is distributed to Department of Labor workers.

AFL-CIO Continues Fight Against Privatization of Social Security

Thu, 03 Feb 2005 08:53:51 -0800

As President Bush brings his social security privatization pitch to midwest states today - including North and South Dakota and Nebraska - the AFL-CIO is joining other progressive groups to rally against it. AFL-CIO midwest representative Shelley Seeberg says that draining money from social security into private accounts undermines social security while creating as much as $2 trillion more in federal debt. Seeberg says that not only does
Bush's irresponsible scheme not strengthen social security, but it undermines it.

[Shelley Seeberg]: "Well the truth of the matter is under the Bush plan social security would run out of money fourteen years sooner than is now expected. So essentially, this makes social security funding problems worse, not better."

NYC Central Labor Council weighs in on Social Security reform

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 12:41:09 -0800

By Doug Cunningham

The New York City Central Labor Council's Ed Ott says the battle to save social security is a must-win for labor and progressives.

[Ed Ott 1]: "We cannot afford to lose this fight. This is the end of everything we¹ve built over 75 years. If they do this, nothing, nothing will survive."

Ott says social security is NOT in crisis and Republicans who have always hated it now see a political opportunity to destroy it.

[Ed Ott2]: "They like the idea that people are out there scratchin¹ and clawin¹ for their next meal because it lowers the wage bill for the employers. That's what it¹s about."

Social Security fight taken to door step of Charles Schwab

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 08:17:21 -0800

The AFL-CIO is launching a national grassroots fight to defend social security against the Bush privatization attempt. Actions in San Francisco and Boston Wednesday singled out financial firms like Charles Schwab
urging them not to assist social security privatization. Tim Paulson is the Executive Director of the San Francisco Labor Council.

[Tim Paulson]: "Social security is not broken and the only thing that's attempted to be broken is the promise to working men and women that when they retire that they will have guaranteed benefits. And we believe that corporate America is just drooling right now waiting to get a piece of our retirement and make sure that they can profit off of it and let it get into the speculative realm."

The AFL-CIO believes that private financial companies, rocked by corporate crime and scandal in recent years, should never be trusted to handle social security accounts.

Economics professor claims no Social Security crisis

Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:43:31 -0800

Eastern Washington University economics professor Doug Orr is convinced there’s no social security crisis so nothing needs to be done to “save” it. Orr says those who hate social security are out to gut it – in part to give business a tax cut while dismantling what remains of the social safety net for workers…

[Professor Doug Orr 1]: “I think the larger goal of destroying social security is to destroy part of that sense of security for working people in America which will make them much more at the mercy of their employers.”