"WE DON'T WANT NO PRIVATIZATION"

www.progressreport.org

3/15/2005

SOCIAL SECURITY -- "WE DON'T WANT NO PRIVATIZATION": President Bush's
effort to rally support for his Social Security privatization scheme is
going very badly. A new Washington Post/ABC poll shows " only 35
percent of Americans now saying they approve of his handling of the issue
(http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A35231-2005Mar14?language=printer)
," while "56 percent disapprove of his approach." Among younger workers
-- whom the administration claims love the idea of private accounts --
support for the plan is not much higher. According to the poll, "only
40 percent of these younger workers say they support Bush's Social
Security proposal."

SOCIAL SECURITY -- BUSINESS GROUP BACKS OUT: Signaling "more troubles
ahead" for President Bush's campaign to privatize Social Security, a
group representing the nation's biggest financial companies and headed by
former Rep. Rick Lazio (R-NY) said Monday it had backed out of a
business coalition raising millions to back President Bush's campaign
(http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-social15mar15,0,5776783,print.story?coll=la-home-nation)
. The Financial Services Forum, which represents Citigroup, Goldman
Sachs and American Express, was a co-founder of the Coalition for the
Modernization and Protection of America's Social Security (Compass), but
has left the coalition because its members could not endorse President
Bush's plan to divert payroll taxes into private accounts. "We never
really came to a consensus on things like personal accounts," said Ken
Trepeta, the forum's vice president. "I couldn't in good conscience sign
our guys up for this." The forum's retreat "follows the decision by two
securities firms -- Edward Jones and Waddell & Reed -- to drop out of a
related lobbying group set up to promote private accounts on Capitol
Hill, the Alliance for Worker Retirement Security."