If there's any silver lining to the current credit crisis, it is the widening realization that forcing people to manage their own retirement accounts is nasty and irresponsible public policy. It's one thing to manage your 401(k), knowing a fixed pension is also coming your way from Social Security. It is another to have to manage your Social Security investments as well, which is what privatization is all about.
Reality bit over the last month. Not only do markets fall, but even money market funds may not be safe. Who knew? Not the pros. So how can the amateurs? There was the retired woman on the front page of the Wall Street Journal who had one third of her next egg in the local bank, now gone belly up. She couldn't imagine that bank's demise. But let's not forget the thousands of employees who lost most of their personally managed retirement funds at Enron not too long ago. And countless other examples.
How can a decent society expect people to manage their entire retirement next egg on their own? How dare they call that personal responsibility? Yet that is exactly what the privatizers, now led by John McCain, would like us to do. Barack Obama has taken on the McCain privatization plan in ads in Florida. He should take them on nationwide. Grandchildren are watching their grandparents get punished by the unexpected market woes. Even the young are beginning to understand the cruel folly of privatization.
On top of which, people increasingly must manage their retirement accounts as business abandons the defined benefit pension for the defined contribution plan.
Let's devote the nation's attention to guaranteeing the fixed benefits of Social Security and put privatization (including medical savings accounts) to bed for a long night's sleep.