For beneficiaries, it's better that the bonds are there, because Treasury bonds are a contract out of which no Congress can weasel. No, Schieber says. We've got a bunch of paper bonds that are stored in a filing cabinet in a cave in West Virginia. Real assets could be cashed in and spent. No, says Schieber.
Individual control brings financial risk.
Because of that, Schieber wouldn't replace the whole system. A funded system offers a way out. But it is not 1939. Whatever the reformers come up with, it's unlikely that any generation will ever get the sort of deal his father got.