We’re Not This Easily Fooled

      Yuval Levy of the right wing American Enterprise Institute has written a op ed piece for the New York Times that starts out with a beautifully phrased defense of Social Security and Medicare as “an act of intergenerational gratitude and generosity” that he regards as laudable and necessary but then ends by endorsing a plan to end Social Security as we have known it and substituting a universal benefit set just above the poverty line. He doesn’t even suggest the possibility of survivor and disability benefits. The right wing never discusses survivor and disability benefits. They don’t fit into their Social Security “reform” schemes. Levy goes on about how a universal benefit set just above the poverty line plan lifts a few seniors out of poverty. He doesn’t mention that this plan would mean a dramatic cut in benefits for most. His idea for a voluntary defined contribution plan on top of his version of “Social Security” hardly changes things. At best, that’s a retirement crap shoot compared with the actual “security” in Social Security not to mention that a vast number, probably most, workers wouldn’t make the voluntary contributions. 

     In its own way this may be the most disgusting piece of right wing anti-Social Security propaganda I’ve ever seen. He must think that we’re all fools. This idiotic plan would destroy Social Security and lead to riots in the streets. Levy can dress up his rhetoric with paeans about intergenerational obligations all he wants but his hostility to the very concept of Social Security is obvious. The plan is simple. Transform “Social Security” into something that is widely despised, then end it. That’s the aim of every right wing plan for Social Security “reform.”

Faultless In Seattle

      The Seattle Times has a feature where readers can share their rants and raves. Here’s a recent one:

RAVE to the Social Security office downtown. Everyone in the building and the office was very kind, helpful and pleasant from the security people at the main door to the security in the Social Security office itself to the clerk in the office who handled my problem. The officer at the front door even saved my glove that I dropped when I went into the building to give to me when I left. A special thank you to all of the folks that I met there that day.

President’s Proposed Budget

     The President’s proposed budget proposes an appropriation for Social Security’s operating budget of $15.5 billion, an increase of nearly $1.4 billion, from the current Fiscal Year. This would be effective with the beginning of FY 2024 on October 1, 2023, if enacted, but Congressional Republicans say they favor massive spending cuts, even though they do not specify what they want cut.

Don’t Even Think About Doing This

      From a press release:

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado announced Justin Skiff, age 36, of Castle Pines, pleaded guilty today to wire fraud, social security fraud and money laundering.

According to the plea agreement, beginning around August 2019 and continuing through September 2021, Skiff used his position as a claims specialist with the Social Security Administration (SSA), to fraudulently obtain money from the SSA. Skiff used his knowledge and access to establish Social Security Numbers for ten fictitious children. He then established fictitious records of entitlements for surviving child benefits which he connected to the record of a real deceased individual whose children would receive benefits. These benefits were deposited into a bank account accessible to Skiff through debit cards he directed to be mailed to a P.O. Box to which he had access. Skiff withdrew money and made purchases from this account from October 2019 through September 2021 for a total amount of $324,201.44.

Judge Daniel D. Domenico presided over the change of plea hearing on March 8, 2023. Skiff will be sentenced on June 6, 2023. Wire fraud carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. Social Security fraud carries a penalty of up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. Money laundering carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $500,000 or twice the value of the property involved in the transaction. Skiff must also forfeit any property derived from proceeds traceable to the scheme.

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Turmoil In France Over Attempt To Raise Retirement Age

     From CBC:

French unions stepped up their fight against President Emmanuel Macron's pension reform plans on Tuesday as most trains came to a halt, fuel deliveries were disrupted and schools shut in a sixth day of nationwide strikes.

To increase pressure on lawmakers not to raise the pension age by two years to 64, unions said there would be rolling strikes this time, which could go on for days, including at oil refineries and railways.

Street protests are expected to take place in more than 300 towns and cities. ...

Garbage collectors and truck drivers joined the strike, in a sign the protests were spreading to more sectors. ...

Rallies are planned across France after more than 1.27 million people took part in previous protests on Jan. 31. ...

There were reports of students blocking schools while BFM-TV showed footage of workers abandoning cars on the side of the road near Amiens in northern France as others blocked access to an industrial zone. ...

Public Servants

      While I was at a concert recently, I wasn’t trying to listen in but happened to overheard a snippet of the conversation of the people sitting next to me during the intermission. One of them referred to someone who “retired after a 36 year career as a public servant.” That struck me. That term “public servant” is one you don’t hear much these days. I think it was more used when government employees were held in higher esteem. Why are they held in lower esteem now? I’d say it mostly has to do with Republican attacks on government and government employees. These attacks are often direct and angry  — as in claiming that government is always the source of problems rather than the solution to many problems or that there’s some “Deep State” that frustrates Republican presidents — but they’re also indirect. Underfunded government agencies render poor public service feeding public perceptions that government employees are to blame for frustrating interactions with public employees. It’s an anarchistic approach that claims, in essence, that government is so terrible that we would be better off with no government. If you can’t directly end government, make it function worse and worse to move the public in the direction of your view, mindless opposition to all government.

    We need to honor public servants. They do a super job often under difficult circumstances.

I Demand You Reopen That Field Office

     A New York Congressman demands that Social Security reopen a field office it has closed in his district. I wish they’d get as excited about the agency’s operating budget. That’s what determines how much service that Social Security can deliver.