A Guide to Posts on Social Security Reform

Welcome to any readers who arrived here from the link in the local Valley News' article, "Democrats Raise Issue of Raising Social Security Income Cap," by John Gregg. His article makes reference to this post and an interview from last week.

If you would like additional information (and opinion) about Social Security reform, there are a few ways to navigate the site to find it.

1) John's article quotes me in one part as follows:

“As a … conservative, I would prefer to do almost everything on the benefit side, that's how I'm wired,” said Samwick, who supports funneling some Social Security payments into “personal” (or what opponents call “private”) accounts for recipients. “But if you are going to raise (revenue) from taxes, raising the cap is probably the most reasonable way to do it.”

That's an accurate quote, but it could use some clarification that is permitted by a blog if not the space constraints at the Valley News. To see a conservative approach to reforming Social Security, see these three early posts on the topic from October 2004:

• Why Is Social Security a Campaign Issue?
• How to Reform Social Security, Part I
• How to Reform Social Security, Part II

For a very good reform proposal that would appeal to those on the political left, see this post from the same month:

• What Social Security Reform Should Democrats Propose?

2) Along with Jeff Liebman, a former advisor to President Clinton, and Maya MacGuineas, an advisor to Senator McCain in his 2000 Presidential campaign, I have proposed a Nonpartisan Social Security Reform Plan. The plan documents are here, and my initial post on it is here. It represents the sort of compromise that we think could emerge from a genuine bipartisan effort to restore long-term solvency to Social Security.

3) There's plenty of other writing about Social Security on this blog. You can find it:

• A post-by-post listing in Part I (through May 2005) and Part II (since then) of the Social Security archive.
• A single link to all posts tagged as being about Social Security.
• A search for the term "Social Security," linked here.

Enjoy!