Perspectives on the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security
Perspectives on the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security
复制标题
对总统加强社会保障委员会的看法
DOI：
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发表时间：
2002
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Andrew G. Biggs
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Andrew G. Biggs
2001年5月任命了加强社会保障总统委员会，以制定建议，保护今天的退休人员的福利；加强社会保障的长期财政可持续性；并让年轻工人有机会将部分工资税投资于他们将拥有、控制并能够传递给子女的个人退休账户。该委员会去年12月提交给总统的三项改革建议履行了这些义务。欧盟委员会于2001年8月发布的中期报告，对当前系统的信托基金融资提出了质疑，并质疑了该计划的进步性。这些发现引发了相当大的公众争议。该委员会的最终报告提出了通过个人账户加强社会保障的三个不同计划，引发了更多辩论。尽管欧盟委员会的三项计划涵盖了一系列方法，但这些提议都有重要的共同点。这三个计划都将提供高于当前制度所能支付的福利，而低收入工人--反对私人账户的人声称最担心的人--将获得高于现行制度下承诺的福利。此外，这三个计划都将产生这些好处，成本低于维持当前计划的成本。该委员会招致了反对个人账户的人士的强烈批评。委员会的工作没有吸引到的是关于如何在没有个人账户的情况下保持社会保障的偿债能力和长期可持续性的实质性反建议。社会保障辩论的下一阶段是让账户反对者将他们自己的提案摆到桌面上。不采取行动，这是反对者最常提出的“政策”，不是一个可行的选择。对论点和证据的审查发现，与当前计划的信托基金机制相比，总统委员会提出的基于个人账户的提案提供了一种更好的方式来为未来的社会保障福利预筹资金；老年贫困的保护将得到加强，累进性将得到增强；工人将有权拥有、控制和传递他们的社会保障储蓄；基于个人账户的提案有能力以更低的长期成本支付更高的福利，而不是传统的现收现付的社会保障融资方法。2002年8月22日SSP第27号
T President’s Commission to Strengthen Social Security was appointed in May 2001 to formulate proposals that would protect benefits for today’s retirees; enhance Social Security’s fiscal sustainability for the long term; and give younger workers the opportunity to invest part of their payroll taxes in personal retirement accounts that they would own, control, and be able to pass on to their children. The commission’s three reform proposals, delivered to the president in December, fulfill those obligations. The commission’s interim report, issued in August 2001, cast doubt on the current system’s trust fund financing and questioned the program’s progressivity. Those findings generated considerable public controversy. The commission’s final report, which put forward three distinct plans to strengthen Social Security through personal accounts, generated even more debate. Although the commission’s three plans cover a spectrum of approaches, the proposals have important characteristics in common. All three plans would provide higher benefits than the current system can pay, and lower-income workers—who opponents of private accounts claim to be most concerned about—would receive higher benefits than are promised under the current system. Moreover, all three plans would produce those benefits at a cost lower than that of maintaining the current program. The commission attracted significant criticism from opponents of personal accounts. What the commission’s work did not attract was substantive counterproposals on how to keep Social Security solvent and sustainable over the long term in the absence of personal accounts. The next stage of the Social Security debate is for account opponents to put their own proposals on the table. Inaction, the “policy” most often put forward by opponents, is not a viable option. A review of the arguments and evidence finds that the personal account-based proposals from the President’s Commission provide a better way to pre-fund future Social Security benefits than the current program’s trust fund mechanism; that protections against poverty in old age would be increased and progressivity enhanced; that workers would have the right to own, control, and pass on their Social Security savings; and that personal account-based proposals have the capacity to pay higher benefits at lower long-run costs than the traditional pay-as-you-go method of financing Social Security. August 22, 2002 SSP No. 27