For a lot of people, including George W. Bush, the market is an attractive alternative to social security. Bush proposes to let Americans invest as much as twenty percent of their Social Security contributions in the the market instead. With the market as nervous as it's been the last week, the question is whether investors would want their money there instead of Social Security. Reingenum points out that the market has had down periods from 1968 to 1985, for example, where it barely returned three percent. That's not much more than Social Security, with a lot more uncertainty.
Backers say the public's up for the gamble.
Those investors are smarter than they've ever been. All Rights Reserved.