Brian Gongol
A plainly stupid defense of Social Security
When someone says, "[T]he Social Security Administration continues to send out monthly checks to 35 million retirees and their spouses, 9 million disabled workers and their families, and 6 million families whose breadwinner has died. In other words, the government system has proved to be much less fragile than the private system of retirement savings," and then uses it as an excuse to increase the cost and scope of Social Security, then that person's judgment ought to be held suspect. Yes, Social Security has continued to deliver consistently-sized checks on time. But the system is actuarially unsound, and it will have to consume an ever-larger share of working Americans' paychecks in order to continue delivering those checks. In other words, Social Security is only "less fragile" than private accounts because it's a pyramid scheme in which participation is enforced by the long arm of the law. Were it a voluntary system, no sensible person would participate.
Flash flooding in southern Iowa
Graphic of the day: Contagious
But it's nothing compared to a delightfully funny image of a rooster racing for his life away from a flu-infected hog
