Unexpectedly Intriguing!
18 February 2005

It was always bound to happen, and now Senator Harry Reid and Senator Charles Schumer have unveiled their version of a Social Security versus Personal Retirement Account comparison calculator. I've been contributing to discussions of the validity of the Senators' math in other forums, so I won't re-address my points here at Political CalculationsTM. I prefer to focus on my own math, and others are doing an excellent job in taking apart the cherry-picked assumptions behind the senatorial Democrats version, in some cases picking up things I had missed in my own analysis. Here is the short list of sites to pick up on my thoughts and those of others:

In news from MSM sources, Robert Robb of the Arizona Republic notes that "a cottage industry has sprung up calculating what sort of returns personal accounts would have to generate for workers to be ahead." He continues, observing:

But these are based on reductions in traditional benefits Bush hasn't specified, compared to a current Social Security system that somehow gets miraculously fixed.

If I'm not mistaken, he is referring to the Reid/Schumer comparison calculator - I wonder if this recognition was dropped for space limitations for the print edition. In any case, you would think the effort put forth by a major political party wouldn't be described as being the product of a "cottage industry."

I'll continue updating this post as more insights are added around the blogosphere.

About Political Calculations

Welcome to the blogosphere's toolchest! Here, unlike other blogs dedicated to analyzing current events, we create easy-to-use, simple tools to do the math related to them so you can get in on the action too! If you would like to learn more about these tools, or if you would like to contribute ideas to develop for this blog, please e-mail us at:

ironman at politicalcalculations

Thanks in advance!

Recent Posts

Indices, Futures, and Bonds

Closing values for previous trading day.

Most Popular Posts
Quick Index

Site Data

This site is primarily powered by:

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

CSS Validation

Valid CSS!

RSS Site Feed

AddThis Feed Button

JavaScript

The tools on this site are built using JavaScript. If you would like to learn more, one of the best free resources on the web is available at W3Schools.com.

Other Cool Resources

Blog Roll

Market Links

Useful Election Data
Charities We Support
Shopping Guides
Recommended Reading
Recently Shopped

Seeking Alpha Certified

Archives