NPR: The Campaign Issue That Dare Not Speak Its Name

The Campaign Issue That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Quick, can you name the one issue that is key to the future of every American that sends most politicians (Including the current presidential contenders) fleeing in terror?

Yes, its social security. As The Associated Press reports "Trustees for the government's two biggest benefit programs warned that Social Security and Medicare were facing 'enormous challenges,' with the threat to Medicare's solvency far more severe." The trustees said unless something is done, the resources in the Social Security trust fund would be depleted by 2041. The reserves in the Medicare trust fund that pays hospital benefits were projected to be wiped out by 2019 - just a little over ten years from now.

Yet Senators Obama, Clinton and McCain have reacted to this alarming news with overwhelming ... silence for the most part. As the Los Angeles Times reports they all "sidestepped the issue."

"Everybody knows that there are a couple of 800-pound gorillas under the rug, but nobody wants to talk about them because that is not the route to the Oval Office," said economist Robert D. Reischauer, president of the Urban Institute public policy center. "The situation is unsustainable in the long run, but the long run is in the future, and our political system operates very much in the present."

One reason for this "see no evil" approach to the issue is that no matter how you try and fix it, raising taxes are going to have to be part of the situation. And a politician would rather chew off his or her leg than say "raise taxes."

"You can't tell people, 'I'll never change Social Security and Medicare,' or 'I'll never raise taxes,' " said David M. Walker, former head of the congressional Government Accountability Office and a leading advocate of reforming entitlements. "If you take things off the table, it significantly undercuts the ability to get a deal."

Actually, Obama did say something on the issue, but it was a one-paragraph e-mailed statement that blamed the problem on "Washington's failure to overcome the special interests and pass health care reform that expands coverage and lower costs." While Obama said Medicare could be kept solvent by investing in "proven measures to improve the health of all Americans and reduce health care cost across the economy" he said nothing about the problem with Social Security.

1:20 PM ET | 03-26-2008 | permalink

Comments

The Social Security issue is a red herring. Paul Krugman lays out the real issue succintly:

" The Social Security system won't be in trouble: it will, in fact, still have a growing trust fund, because of the interest that the trust earns on its accumulated surplus. The only way Social Security gets in trouble is if Congress votes not to honor U.S. government bonds held by Social Security. That's not going to happen. So legally, mechanically, 2018 has no meaning.

Now it's true that rising benefit costs will be a drag on the federal budget. So will rising Medicare costs. So will the ongoing drain from tax cuts. So will whatever wars we get into. I can't find a story under which Social Security payments, as opposed to other things, become a crucial budgetary problem in 2018.

What we really have is a looming crisis in the General Fund. Social Security, with its own dedicated tax, has been run responsibly; the rest of the government has not. So why are we talking about a Social Security crisis? "

Sent by Chester | 2:14 PM ET | 03-26-2008

evidence that

clinton campaign has been calling delegates in Iowa and asking them to change their vote. A family member of mine is a delegate for Obama and he has received calls from the Clinton campaign. He has also received calls from the Obama campaign asking him to remain a delegate.

He won't switch and told the Clinton campaign their ethics are shady

Sent by nish | 3:15 PM ET | 03-26-2008

Since guest workers do not pay into the Social Security trust funds, thanks to totalization agreements. Business is pushing hard to increase the number of guest workers by millions, including h1b, "best of the best". If they really are the "best of the best", they should be high-wage employees. You should talk about what will happen in ten years when a significant number of people in the work force are not paying into the Social Security system.

Also, I never hear any coverage of the disability side of the Social Security trust fund. How much of the money being paid out is for people with disabilities? How is that changing, and expected to change over time? How many people receiving SSI disability payments have not worked for ten years, or even at all?
I've heard that a significant percentage of the school-age children in some states are receiving disability payments.

Sent by Margaret Bartley | 6:26 PM ET | 04-11-2008

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