{"id":22819,"date":"2022-06-22T13:25:14","date_gmt":"2022-06-22T20:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=22819"},"modified":"2022-06-22T13:25:15","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T20:25:15","slug":"biden-taps-anti-social-security-ideologue-to-oversee-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2022\/06\/22\/biden-taps-anti-social-security-ideologue-to-oversee-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Biden Taps Anti-Social Security Ideologue To Oversee Program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Jun 21, 2022 \u2022 Matthew Cunningham-Cook<\/a> (levernews.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Biden nominated Andrew Biggs, a think tank denizen with a history of slamming Social Security, to oversee government retirement benefits for 66 million Americans.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Andrew Biggs (credit: American Enterprise Institute)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Last month, President Joe Biden nominated<\/a> a longtime advocate of Social Security privatization and benefit cuts to a key board overseeing the Social Security system. The move comes as Republicans get ready to push<\/a> cuts to Social Security and Medicare, if they end up winning control of Congress during the November\u2019s midterms, as expected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The development suggests that there could soon be a coordinated push in Washington to cut the Social Security program, which provides retirement, disability, and survivor benefits to 66 million Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 13<\/a>, Biden chose to nominate Andrew Biggs, a fellow at the right-wing American Enterprise Institute think tank, for a Republican seat on the bipartisan Social Security Advisory Board, which was created<\/a> in 1994 to consult the president and Congress about the Social Security system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For years, Biggs has been a vocal critic of expanded Social Security and workers\u2019 right to a secure, stable retirement free from the vagaries of the stock market. He has dismissed the retirement crisis as a non-issue<\/a> and as recently as 2020 blamed<\/a> problems with the Social Security system on \u201colder Americans\u2019 game of chicken.\u201d And two decades ago, Biggs worked on a Bush administration commission that pushed to privatize Social Security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response to questions from The Lever<\/em>, Biggs suggested he no longer favors privatizing Social Security. Instead, he said he now believes that nations\u2019 Social Security-like programs should be \u201cmore focused on guaranteeing against poverty in old age while middle and high-income individuals take on greater responsibility for saving for retirement on their own, such as by the government establishing universal retirement savings accounts for every worker.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Establishing such savings accounts would be a solution in search of a problem. Social Security is incredibly successful<\/a> at delivering retirement benefits, and raising taxes on the wealthy would be a straightforward way to expand the program. Alternatively, creating retirement accounts invested in the stock market would involve a much more unwieldy and risky expansion of government programs \u2014 and would be a huge boon to Wall Street.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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While the seat on the bipartisan board is by tradition assigned to a Republican, Biden could have chosen a moderate candidate \u2014 or even leaned on precedent to avoid the nomination process altogether. Former President Donald Trump routinely refused<\/a> to nominate Democrats for seats on boards and commissions. Furthermore, Biden could use the efforts of Senate Republicans<\/a> to block speedy confirmation of many of his nominees as justification for holding the seat open, said Jeff Hauser, director at the Revolving Door Project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell\u2019s caucus continues to slow-march consensus presidential nominees in order to limit the filling of vacant judgeships, independent agency commissioner slots, U.S. Attorney positions, and senior department officials,\u201d said Hauser, \u201cretaliation against an ardent opponent of Social Security would be both well warranted and good politics.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCarpal Tunnel Syndrome From Your Mouse Or Something\u201d<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

For Biggs, attempting to milk government programs for private-sector profits is nothing new.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2001, Biggs was a staff analyst on George W. Bush\u2019s commission on Social Security that advocated privatizing the government program by shifting<\/a> the programs\u2019 trust fund investments from U.S. Treasury bills to high-fee, high-risk \u201cpersonal accounts\u201d that  seniors could use to invest Social Security assets in the stock and bond markets, like employees do with their 401(k) plans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After that, Biggs spent four years working as an associate commissioner of the Social Security Administration, which administers the Social Security program, while Bush unsuccessfully<\/a> pushed the unprecedented privatization efforts recommended by the 2001 commission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A sample of Biggs\u2019 writings on Social Security over the years shows that he:<\/p>\n\n\n\n