That's what most members of the government's Advisory Council on Social Security concluded last week, as the group suggested three reform options that would postpone the day, now only about 15 years away, when the program will begin to collect less in taxes than it has promised to pay out in benefits. A second option, backed by two other council members, would allow a lesser degree of individual control. But to hear the howls of protest from union leaders, the seniors lobby and many Democratic lawmakers, you might think the pro-market council members had proposed to hand the keys to the Treasury over to a group of particularly selfish and spendthrift adolescents. This would, they said, undermine support for Social Security's lesser-known role as a safety net for the working poor and disabled. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the New York Democrat, predicted that the safety-net part of the program would suffer the fate of welfare.
Women feel more vulnerable than men to calamities like sudden single parenthood.
And in today's tumultuous, hyper-competitive, global economy, which creates many new jobs but with less security, men as well as women can imagine themselves needing help someday to keep their health insurance during a period of unemployment, to get loans for additional education or to support themselves if the stock market crashes just before they retire. The majority of Americans can afford to save for their own retirement, and will need to do so. And the system would maintain a safety-net program that would prevent any retiree from sinking into poverty. Senate majority leader Trent Lott seemed to understand this distinction at the end of the congressional session last summer, when he broke a logjam to pass not only welfare reform but also an increase in the minimum wage and a bill making health insurance more portable as workers move between jobs. Voters rewarded him and his colleagues with the Senate's highest approval ratings in a decade and with a Republican gain of two seats in the November elections.