DISQUS

This is clearly fake. "From what i understand, it went through my left hand..." There would be no guessing. It BURNS. There has been no person struck by a lightning that was not left with burn damage.

Gareth: fair point about the SSA, but it's still not like the British government's theoretical ability to take your house, because you already have your house. Something is being taken rather than withheld. And afaik you can't do lots of things with your Social Security benefits that you could usually do with property. For example, I understand that you can't assign them to another person or offer them as security on a loan. The only thing future Social Security benefits have in common with genuine property is that both are politically difficult to abolish. As I've said before, something being politically difficult to interfere with doesn't make it a property right.

In any case Congress would never have to repudiate the government's obligations to the trust fund by defaulting; it would only have to cut benefits payable. If it did that, the "trust fund" could keep getting bigger and bigger even as benefits got smaller and smaller (and because they were getting smaller and smaller).

Gareth: to clarify, you're right that property rights only exist when it is politically unthinkable to interfere with them, but not everything it is politically unthinkable to interfere with is a property right. It would be politically unthinkable to repeal the First Amendment, but I don't have a property right in my freedom of religion.

Gareth: sorry for not being clear; I didn't mean that the only real property rights were rights you could sue the government to enforce. Even in the UK, you can presumably still sue for relief if someone tries to steal your house (i.e. sue the person who stole the house, not the government). But even in the UK there would be a difference between a property right in a government obligation and a mere government promise; if the government just refuses to honor a contract (e.g. if you're an employee and they don't pay you due to a screwup in their accounting division, then refuse to pay) you can presumably sue for relief. Americans have no property right in their Social Security benefits; if the Social Security Administration doesn't pay you due to a mistake, you can ask them to correct the situation, but you can't sue. So whether or not we have a property right in Social Security (no) has real legal teeth even today.

And as I've argued before, the Fifth Amendment means that if Americans had a genuine property right in Social Security, their payments would be more secure than they are today. There's a major difference between "Congress could cut or eliminate your benefits by changing one number in a statute" and "Congress could cut or eliminate your benefits by passing a law abolishing a property right, fighting things out with the Supreme Court, and then, if they win, changing a number in a statute."

Of course, if the government is sufficiently confiscation-happy or judicial or executive authorities refuse to enforce property rights against violators, property rights don't really exist, but that's not the situation under consideration.

Protagoras: the difference is in the right to sue for relief. In this case the difference between a property right and a promise is particularly acute, since Fifth Amendment says the government can't just confiscate your stuff without compensation. (It can tax, but that's not the same thing.) Hence my suggestion above that if Republicans and Will were really interested in protecting future Social Security benefits, they'd be pushing to define a property right in those benefits as they are defined today.

Will:

If the real concern is that future Congresses will cut Social Security benefits, there are lots of ways the security of those benefits could be dramatically increased. George Bush could barnstorm around the country saying that any future President or Congress that tries to cut Social Security benefits from the amount retirees are entitled to under current law (or default on the "Trust Fund") is un-American and deserves to be voted out of office. He could write a "Contract with America" to that effect and demand that all Republican lawmakers sign it. He could use his influence to put that principle at the front of the Republican Party platform.

He could even write a new "Social Security Civil Rights Act" giving Americans a property right in their benefits (at the amount they are entitled to under current law) and the right to sue to receive them if cut or taxed above a certain level. As for the trust fund, he could insist that future surplus tax revenues from the so-called "Social Security tax" be invested in securities under the auspices of an independent agency designed along the lines of the Federal Reserve (with directors with long enough tenure to insulate them from political pressure).

Cutting benefits under that scenario would be pretty darn hard. Marginally easier than confiscating retirees' "personal" retirement accounts? Maybe. Easier than jacking up the tax rate on capital gains realized through "personal" retirement accounts" (which has the same practical effect as partial confiscation)? Definitely not.

If you're still worried that Congress would abolish Americans' property rights in Social Security and cut their benefits even under those conditions, the President could even be pushing for a Constitutional amendment to protect them (with a special provision for repeal under conditions of national emergency with the consent of some kind of Congressional supermajority).

The problem here is that you libertarians (and the Republicans) aren't interested in strengthening Social Security - you want to destroy it. That's fine, but don't try to change the subject - make the honest argument that "personal" accounts are the feasible second-best to abolition.

For the record, my dream would be to abolish the payroll tax, increase the income tax, and turn Social Security payments into a means-tested welfare program. But the stigma attached to "welfare" would make it too easy for y'all to cut benefits, so defending what we have now is the feasible second-best to that. And I'll say it loud and proud.