Obama’s Remarks on Social Security Still Making Waves
Some Democratic lawmakers are concerned about the reference to Social Security that President Obama made in his speech last month. D-13th District Representative Albio Sires stated that said passage was strange and that he wanted to know what the President meant.
The reference to Social Security was brought up near the end of the speech that Obama made. He said that there was a need to cut the spending to reduce the deficit. He also noted that in order to preserve the nation’s long-term fiscal health, the growing expenses related to Medicare and Social Security need to be addressed. He stated that comprehensive health care reform would be the best method to strengthen Medicare. He also said that there was a need for a discussion regarding strengthening Social Security as tax-free universal savings accounts are created for Americans.
His comment was actually quite similar to what ex-President George W. Bush said back in 2005. He had suggested the creation of private savings accounts. Many Democrats, along with some Republicans instantly rejected the idea, which gave Bush a major policy loss. Because of this, lawmakers are starting to wonder whether Obama was about to propose the same idea that Bush did.
Other than this particular comment, though, most of the ideas Obama announced were well-received by his party. The opposition on the other hand, reacted to his ideas with some tepid applause. Later on, some lawmakers said that the reason why the Social Security remark did not receive much applause was that the people could have been too tired of having get up for an ovation to applaud the president that they might have let that one pass.
Some other reactions from lawmakers were denial. Some said that private savings accounts really had nothing to do with the issue of Social Security. Moira Mack, the White House spokeswoman, said that Obama was looking forward to working with the Congress so that all the details could be ironed out.
During his campaign, Obama condemned what he referred to as the “privatization” of Social Security. However, the Democrats who criticized Bush back in 2005 called everything that he proposed “privatization” although he stressed the voluntary nature of the use of private savings accounts in supplementing or replacing retirement income.
Their point was if people can opt out of this system, the whole idea of having a security net would ultimately collapse. In effect, it had to be universal forced savings.
D-1st District Representative Robert Andrews, the House Labor and Education’s pensions subcommittee chair, said that Obama would not do anything in order to tamper with benefits. Andrews stated that he was drafting a legislation so that low-income workers would have an easier time maintaining their savings accounts that they could use for their retirement.
However, D-10th District Representative Donald Payne said that he was not so sure that this is what the President meant. He said that that Obama keeps on offering things to Republicans in the hopes of getting bipartisan support.
The most interesting remark about the subject, however, was made by Gene Sparling, who was a Treasury policy analyst. He said that the private accounts are not going to be a part of Social Security reform itself but later added that it does not mean, though, that they could not be part of a package.
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