"Fixing" Social Security

The general idea behind Social Security is to encourage...no, force people to save. But the government has no business telling me how I should save, where I should save or even if I should save. In a free society, people should have complete control over their own money—quite a novel concept these days.

Contrary to popular belief, there is nothing private or even remotely capitalist about George W. Bush's "privatization" plan. His is a prescription for yet more government control. If he gets his way, bureaucrats—many of whom retire with pensions ranging in the hundreds of thousands of dollars—will tell you which stocks you can invest in, how much you can invest, how much you can withdraw and the rate at which it can be withdrawn. On top of that, in order to make your investments "safe," there will have to be more regulations imposed to prop up those stocks.

Put simply, market forces won't apply. It's a proposal that pays lip service to capitalist ideals while at the same time undermining the free market. (Besides, anyone who honestly believes that the feds will have no way of getting their hands on these so-called "private" accounts is living in a dreamworld.)

Unfortunately, conservatives will go along with this ridiculous plan simply because it's "better" than what the Democrats are proposing. Here's an idea: why not start to phase out Social Security? Fulfill the obligations to those currently collecting checks and then offer a refund to people for evey dime they've paid into it. Finally, allow the rest to opt out completely.

The problem is that Republicans can't even bring themselves to admit that the entire concept of a government-controlled retirement plan is not only unconstitutional, it's immoral. Until we get to that point, things will keep getting worse.