Robert Kuttner on the deficit scolds' attack on Social Security

Robert Kuttner in The Stealth Attack on America's Best-Loved Program Huffington Post 06/18/2010 gives us a good reminder of who actually stands to benefit from the "privatization" (aka, abolition) of the system of social insurance known as Social Security:

So why the continued political threat to America's best loved and most successful government program?

The main reason is that Wall Street looks at all that money and imagines the fees that could be collected if it were diverted to private accounts. It's no wonder that Democrats like Robert Rubin (Goldman Sachs and Citigroup) and Republicans like Peter G. Peterson (Blackstone Group) are the mainstays of the bipartisan crowd proclaiming a crisis of Social Security and promoting a cut in benefits, or privatization -- both of which would produce more reliance on Wall Street products.

These are the guys who brought us the financial collapse, with its devastating effect on pension savings, 401k's, home equity, and other private resources on which retirees depend. Now, with no sense of shame, they are going after the one part of the system that was not undermined by the calamity -- public Social Security.

Tags: social security