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Hands Off Social Security
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Top level
Hands Off Social Security
Bush's attack on social security is an attempt by the rightwing extremists and Wall Street to reap immediate and long-term profits, and also to shift the ideological climate decisively to the right. But millions are not being fooled. Here's coverage, resources and action you can take to tell Bush: "Hands off!"
CHICAGO — “Privatizing Social Security may be good business for Charles Schwab, but it’s a bad deal for working Americans,” Chicago Federation of Labor President Dennis Gannon told the multiracial and multigenerational crowd of 300 that overflowed the sidewalk in front of the giant investment firm’s office here. “The stock market is a gamble,” Gannon continued, “I’ve got a mother who is 83, a daughter who is 22 and I’m 52. Privatization puts us all in jeopardy.”
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The California Alliance for Retired Americans (CARA) campaign to maximize strong opposition to the Bush administration’s proposals of privatized Social Security accounts is picking up steam. The group, working with its 105 labor and community affiliates, is organizing 12 town hall meetings throughout the state during March and April focused on convincing congresspersons to sign the AFL-CIO pledge to defend the system.
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Bush got a rocky welcome to Denver, March 21, in the 17th stop on his 60-city, election-style campaign to sell the privatization of Social Security.
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Social Security is a social insurance program that acts as an anti-poverty safety net for families of disabled workers, children of a deceased parent, and senior citizens. Many children, teenagers and college students benefit from the program. If President Bush has his way — to privatize Social Security — these benefits won’t be around for you and generations to come.
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LAS VEGAS — A campaign to defend Social Security, patterned after labor’s massive 2004 election mobilization, was formulated at the annual winter AFL-CIO Executive Council meeting here Feb. 28–March 3. The campaign plan includes strong media and grass roots components.
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?dV¬GH — “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” That’s the message that hundreds of thousands of seniors, students, clergy and union members have sent to Republicans, who have been out on the stump to sell the privatization of Social Security.
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SAGINAW, Mich. — Eric Friedman walked into a hornet’s nest. The district director for Michigan Republican Congressman Dave Camp was taken aback by the wrath of angry constituents. Calling President Bush’s claim that Social Security is bankrupt “a lie,” they demanded that Camp work to raise the cap on payroll taxes so upper-income people pay their fair share into the Social Security fund.
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The PWW recently talked with Pedro Rodriguez, executive director of the Philadelphia branch of the Action Alliance of Senior Citizens. Rodriguez is also executive vice president of the state Alliance for Retired Americans. In these roles, he is currently busy organizing a regional Coalition to Defend Social Security. Ben Sears interviewed Rodriguez for the PWW.
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Social Security plays an exceptionally important role in the economic life of African Americans:
Social Security is the main source of retirement income for most elderly African Americans, and the only source for 40 percent.
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As California labor and community organizations mobilize to uphold Social Security, they are seeing a related development in the concerted drive by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to privatize new state workers’ pensions and eliminate state contributions to teachers’ retirement.
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