Social Security Letter

We will be sending the following letter to Represenative Duncan, Senator Alexander, and Senator Frist. If you would like to add your name on this letter, simply send an email to Alex Youn with the title 'Social Security' with your and MC Box number by Sunday (2.13.2005) and we will take care of the rest!

Dear Representative:

President Bush is claiming a mandate to privatize Social Security. I’m writing to tell you that he has no mandate from me – or from most other Americans – to cut Social Security benefits or add to America’s financial burdens in order to reward his Wall Street backers with risky private accounts.

I am writing to ask where you stand, and to ask you to declare yourself opposed to Bush’s misguided scheme.

Social Security is a bedrock of American values – ensuring that becoming old in America doesn’t mean becoming poor. The President’s plan to cut guaranteed benefits to funnel Social Security dollars through Wall Street traders is expensive and dangerous – I am calling on you to declare your opposition to it.

I would like you to write me back immediately to answer the following crucial questions:

1) Will you oppose privatizing Social Security in any way? (That means that you will oppose any law that funnels Social Security dollars into risky Wall Street private accounts.)

2) Will you oppose any law that raises the retirement age, cuts guaranteed benefits, and/or adds debt onto the backs of young people and future generations?

I and millions of concerned Americans are gearing up to fight the President’s dangerous plan, and we need to know whether you stand with us or with the Wall Street financial interests who are salivating at the chance to earn millions off of our Social Security.

The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that under a partially privatized system proposed by Bush’s Social Security commission, a worker who is 34-years-old today would see benefit cuts of 23%, a 24-year-old worker today would see cuts of 30%, and a child born today (2004) would at retirement have a Social Security benefit 45% smaller than current law would provide.

In short, the Bush privatization plan would be yet another economic hardship forced on working families – especially on younger Americans – adding some $2 trillion in debt onto the backs of future generations in just the first 10 years.

Today’s young people rarely have jobs with real pensions, and low wages make it difficult to save for retirement. Please do not undermine the one reliable source of retirement income that for generations has kept most seniors out of poverty.

Please let me know you won’t be an accomplice to undermining the Social Security system.

--Maryville College Democrats