Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Unfairly burdening politicians 

This fiscal crisis in Social Security affects every generation. We now know that the Social Security trust fund is fine for another few decades. But if it gets in trouble and we don't deal with it, then it not only affects the generation of the baby boomers and whether they'll have enough to live on when they retire, it raises the question of whether they will have enough to live on by unfairly burdening their children and, therefore, unfairly burdening their children's ability to raise their grandchildren....
You might say such an unfair burden would be disgraceful. But say it's disgraceful on the campaign trail, and your opponents go bonkers.

BTW, the quote isn't John McCain. It's Bill Clinton in 1998. (h/t: Greg Mankiw.)

Is transferring money from young to old a disgrace? I don't know, it's a pretty strong statement, but standing against it gives the young just a little less change they can believe in.

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