2.20.2005
The Risks in Personal Accounts (WashingtonPost.com)
Sunday, February 20, 2005; Page B06
NEWLY ELECTED to a second term and possessed of a mandate to cut the "nanny state," Margaret Thatcher set out in 1984 to privatize Britain's state pension system. The result stands as a warning to the Bush administration. The Thatcher reforms empowered unscrupulous salesmen to press inappropriate savings accounts on unsophisticated workers; regulators ultimately required payment of some $24 billion in compensation to the victims. Last year 500,000 Britons who had opted out of the government pension system in favor of private accounts returned ruefully to nanny.
Social Security reform, in short, is risky. Individual retirement accounts can suffer not only from aggressive salesmen but also from high management fees (Chile), disappointing investment returns (Sweden), irresponsible subsidization at the expense of taxpayers (Britain, again) and the danger that workers might seek early access to their money to meet medical emergencies or other expenses, leaving them impoverished in retirement (Singapore). So, despite the significant likely gains from investing in equities via personal accounts, reform doesn't cross the threshold of plausibility unless it is designed to avoid these pitfalls.
(More ... The Risks in Personal Accounts (washingtonpost.com)) ¶ 19:39
NEWLY ELECTED to a second term and possessed of a mandate to cut the "nanny state," Margaret Thatcher set out in 1984 to privatize Britain's state pension system. The result stands as a warning to the Bush administration. The Thatcher reforms empowered unscrupulous salesmen to press inappropriate savings accounts on unsophisticated workers; regulators ultimately required payment of some $24 billion in compensation to the victims. Last year 500,000 Britons who had opted out of the government pension system in favor of private accounts returned ruefully to nanny.
Social Security reform, in short, is risky. Individual retirement accounts can suffer not only from aggressive salesmen but also from high management fees (Chile), disappointing investment returns (Sweden), irresponsible subsidization at the expense of taxpayers (Britain, again) and the danger that workers might seek early access to their money to meet medical emergencies or other expenses, leaving them impoverished in retirement (Singapore). So, despite the significant likely gains from investing in equities via personal accounts, reform doesn't cross the threshold of plausibility unless it is designed to avoid these pitfalls.
(More ... The Risks in Personal Accounts (washingtonpost.com)) ¶ 19:39
