BU Now » retirement financing http://blogs.bu.edu/bunow News, information and research from Boston University Wed, 21 Sep 2011 18:14:24 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.4 Social Security: “Fiscal child abuse” http://blogs.bu.edu/bunow/2010/08/25/social-security-fiscal-child-abuse/ http://blogs.bu.edu/bunow/2010/08/25/social-security-fiscal-child-abuse/#comments Wed, 25 Aug 2010 21:34:39 +0000 Dick Taffe http://blogs.bu.edu/bunow/?p=6685 Social Security cardThe 2010 election season is under way and, as usual, the fate of the federal Social Security system is part of the political debate.  College of Arts and Sciences economics Professor Laurence Kotlikoff, author of “Jimmy Stewart is Dead: Ending the World’s Ongoing Financial Plague with Limited Purpose Banking,” says as the Social Security program marks its 75th anniversary, it’s time to rebuild it into “Personal Security System” retaining the 1930s-vintage system’s best features, scrapping the rest, and covering its costs.  Continuing Social Security without change, he writes in a Bloomberg commentary, amounts to “fiscal child abuse.”

“Our nation is in terribly hot water.  Business as usual is no answer.  The only way to move ahead is to radically reform our retirement, tax, health-care and financial institutions to achieve much more for a lot less.  The Personal Security System is a major step in that direction.  It meets all the legitimate goals of Social Security without the system’s waste and penchant for robbing the young.”

Contact Laurence Kotlikoff, 617-353-4002, kotlikoff@bu.edu

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