Trana Rogne: Social Security Funding Crisis?

To the Editor:

“Can We Save Social Security?” is the headline in Parade, the Sunday newspaper insert.

Just as former President Bush II tried to do, we have another big push to “fix” Social Security, using the hyped-up claims of an impending crisis.

“Contrary to the political rhetoric, Social Security is not in a crisis. According to the Social Security Trustees, ‘Social Security will have sufficient funds to pay full benefits through the year 2037, and even the Congressional Budget Office projects that full benefits can be paid through 2043. Social Security expenditures currently represent only 4.8 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), will grow to only 6.2 percent of GDP by 2034, and will level off at 5.8 percent by 2048.’ While these are annual projections, those projections are unlikely to change significantly in the future.

“The only thing that has changed is the introduction of new, unfounded political rhetoric linking the economic meltdown to the false notion of an entitlement crisis.” (National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.(NCPSSM)).

The reason for this big rush this time seems to be to capitalize on people’s concerns over the large deficit. Some politicians and anti-Social Security special interest groups hope to push through cuts to Social Security to fulfill a long term ideological agenda. They are using the faulty “notion that short-term costs of the economic downturn and the recovery plan ought to be linked to long-term reductions in Social Security and Medicare.” (NCPSSM)

What the newspaper insert did not tell us is what means some politicians and special interest groups intend to use to fix the “problem.”

Our Senator, Kent Conrad, and Senator Gregg, with right wing groups such as, The Pete Peterson Institute with David Walker, “Brookings, Heritage, joined by the American Enterprise Institute, the Concord Coalition, the New America Foundation, the Progressive Policy Institute and the Urban Institute propose a fast track solution, an ‘Entitlement Commission’.” ( The Nation, Feb. 11, 2009)

This appointed commission would make recommendations on the “reform measures” to the Congress. It will be voted on in an up or down format. No changes in the “reform measures” that are recommended by the commission will be permitted. In reality, we have Congressmen who have been raiding the Social Security trust fund for years.

“(M)any analysts believe that the very existence of the Social Security surpluses over the past two decades has made it easier for Congress to run larger deficits in the non-Social Security portion of the budget, essentially using the Social Security surpluses to ‘hide’ larger deficits in the rest of government”. (Center for Retirement Research at Boston College)

Both parties are guilty of this theft of Social Security funds. Congress is not taking the responsibility to fix the problem they caused. Can we say “pass the buck”?

It is remarkable that rather than address the real causes of our national debt, (a decade of borrow-and-spend policies, skyrocketing health care costs, tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and two unfunded wars) these “fiscal hawks” are intent on making Social Security pay the price.

It is time the Senators and Representatives take the job they campaigned for seriously. We need to request of our Senators and Representatives: “Your job is to fix the problem not to appoint a commission to provide cover for your past actions. We elected you to fix problems; if you cannot do it yourselves, quit and let someone else take your job.”

-Trana Rogne
Kindred, N.D.