Liberal Media Wrong Again

Andrew Roth

The liberal media are at it again. This time, they state that the new House bill that would fund personal accounts with treasury bonds would increase the national debt, but they fail to acknowledge that it wouldn't increase the government's debt obligations (I know that sounds contradictory, but keep reading). Excerpt from an AP article:

Issuing the bonds would increase the federal budget deficit, projected this week to be $333 billion next year, by $87 billion, to a total of $420 billion. [Social Security chief actuary Stephen] Goss said similar deficits would increase the national debt $850.7 billion by 2017.

Technically, the AP report and Goss are correct. But the article doesn't tell you the whole story and that makes all the difference in the world. The proposals to fund personal accounts with treasury bonds would increase the national debt and the deficit BUT it would not increase the debt obligations of our government. This is a very important distinction that needs to be properly understood. Because if it isn't, liberals will spin this story into the ground. And, believe me, they can spin horse manure into Egyptian cotton. Here's the deal. The current unfunded promises for Social Security that the government has made is currently off-budget and not used in calculations of the deficit and the overall national debt. That's right. There are currently trillions of dollars in unfunded future benefits that the government owes but doesn't report as part of the national debt. What the new personal accounts proposals do is shine a HUGE SPOTLIGHT on this massively unfunded liability that we call Social Security and make the surplus debt explicit, rather than implicit. In other words, they move it on-budget so that it is calculated in the deficit and the national debt. That will make more people aware of the fact that politicians have continually raided Social Security and it's time that we stop them. That's the truth and the liberal media isn't telling you that. Perhaps they should consult with the forgotten 450 economists next time they write an article on Social Security.
Posted by Andrew Roth on July 16, 2005 3:54 PM to Social Security Choice