Or, at least he once did. Tom Daschle and many other Democrats have no problem with the government investing your money in Social Security, but they have a big problem with you doing it. This is the Cato institute in 1996:
Recently, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) embraced one of the most dangerous ideas to come out of Washington in a long time--allowing the federal government to use the Social Security trust fund to purchase stock in major American companies.
Given Social Security's dire financial condition--the program will run a deficit as early as 2012--it is easy to understand why there is growing interest in attempting to harness the power of private capital markets to bail out the faltering system. However, despite its surface attractiveness, allowing the government to invest funds from the Social Security trust fund in private capital markets would be a terrible mistake that would have severe consequences for the U.S economy.
It is easy to see why Senator Daschle is attracted to such an approach. The Social Security trust fund is currently "invested" in special government bonds, a procedure that allows the federal government to borrow the trust fund and hide the real size of the federal deficit. Allowing the trust fund money to be invested instead in private capital markets would provide an opportunity to earn a much higher rate of return. Using that return to fill in some of the gap between future revenues and benefits would reduce the need for future tax increases or benefit cuts.
In reality, however, that approach is fraught with danger. Allowing the government to invest the trust fund in private capital markets would amount to the socialization of a large portion of the U.S. economy. The federal government would become the nation's largest shareholder, with a controlling interest in nearly every major American company.
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