I've been following with great interest the debate over Social Security that is currently going on. The Bush Administration has a plan that will eventually result in the dismantling of the program as we know it. They keep trying to bill it as a good thing, but just on benefits alone, it's a total lie. Today I saw a very interesting little web application to calculate how much the Bush plan would cost you.

When I was growing up, I was convinced that Social Security wasn't going to be around by the time that I retired. The current projection is for Social Security payments to exceed the trust fund in 2042. At that point benefits would have to be cut partially, but there would still be benefits. I'll be 66 at that point, which means I would still see some benefits. The truth of the matter is that there is no crisis. Using the trustee's own intermediate projections, the program is solvent until 2042, and then would only require benefit cuts - which I might add, are less than the cut which would happen if Bush privatizes Social Security. On top of that, here is a link that suggests that the intermediate projection should really be the high cost projection which suggests that Social Security might be solvent indefinitely anyway.

I'll be following this debate closely; hopefully people wise up to the Bush administration's duplicity. Unfortunately, I doubt they will - no one likes to talk good policy, they just care if the guy seems likable.