When South Park decided to parody Eliot Spitzer's foolish attempts to have unprotected sex with an overpriced hooker, they decided to have a man deliberately letting a cat piss in his face because it would get him high.
So, when I think of Eliot Spitzer, I think of a man with cat piss on his face, running around imagining he is battling mighty foes with his boob-lance.
So after looking at his cherry-picked data, faulty logic, and basic lack of understanding of human behavior, I thought, he must think we're idiots! And then, it occurred to me, that we ARE idiots, and it's just that Eliot didn't put his finger on the precise kind of idiotic behavior privatization of social security would have produced.
One need look no further than the 401k. You can borrow against it, you can tap it early, etc. What does this mean? Tell people they have money, and they will spend it. Nobody is going to be being annuities at age 66 so they never outlive their money! The OPPOSITE will occur! The vast majority of couple I might add, make far less than 100k-to-150k, you elitist adultering prick, will fritter away their money as fast as legally possible. There's businesses advertising on TV to help people convert annuities into "money now": JG Wentworth is one such business. I'm sure it's a horrible deal, just like a payday loan, but, people ARE idiots, and will do it anyway.
And while some of the dumbest will spend it on $4000 hookers, big screen TVs, and gamble it away in casinos, the bulk of the dumb people will do something all the dumber because they think they're being smart. THEY WILL DUMP THE MONEY INTO GETTING A BIGGER HOUSE.
That's the REAL reason why privatizing would have screwed us: we'd have had an even bigger bubble, and an even more catastrophic fall when mr. bubble burst.
Now that I've said the real reason why privatizing is bad, I just want to highlight all the stupid things you said:
1. You cherry picked the years market performance. 2000 was the end of one of the longest stock market booms on the books. Did you think anyone who watched the markets wouldn't remember? Get serious. use LONGTERM market performance. 20-year periods at least.
2. The dow includes companies with longterm performance issues, i.e., GM. additionally, many dow companies pay dividends. So, the dow is not a good indicator of investment returns, even for someone investing in the dow itself.
3. 80% of the population lives in households that make less than 100k. if you only have the energy for one example, you should really choose an example of a couple making far far less money, a more average couple. Don't bore us with the plight of the upper middle class!
4. Annuities aren't very popular. I would not pay anyone 500k to pay me 3k every month for the rest of my life even now, let along when I'm 66. One, I think I'm smarter and can beat that ROI, even if if I'm not and I can't, two, I want flexibility-- money available for emergencies, not doeled out in pathetic chunks, and three many companies offering annuities are kinda shitty companies I wouldn't trust to last to pay out the payments in perpetuity, four, I fear inflation. 3k a month doesn't even go far NOW, and will will go even less far and less far as you age and get less healthy and need it even more. Of course, we all know you wouldn't use your 500k to buy an annuity... 500k is only 125 visits to your favorite hooker!
5. People retire when they can afford to. Some people go early, some work into their 70s. And, If you privatize social security, you'll widen the bell curve-- more early retirees, and, if times when the market is bad, more people holding on to those jobs and earning just a little bit longer until the market rebounds. This of course, will REALLY screw the kids graduating college. if there's a recession, kids, their will be no jobs for you. not only will the job market suck, you'll be competing with old farts with a 30-year experience advantage trying to pad their retirement nest egg just a bit more.
6. Social security is not a ponzi scheme, precisely because the young are FORCED to pay in, knowing they could probably get a better return on "investment" elsewhere. Ponzi schemes, when running, are "too good to be true". Social Security, when running, is "So shitty we debate privatizing it".
