77 Years After FDR Signs Social Security, VP Pick Paul Ryan Pushes Dismantling the Social Safety Net
Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney’s newly picked running mate, Paul Ryan, is on the forefront of efforts to dismantle Social Security by putting seniors’ savings into risky Wall Street investments. Over the years, Ryan has not only pushed for privatizing Social Security, but also dismantling Medicare and slashing funding for Medicaid. In the Republican response to President Obama’s 2011 State of the Union address, Ryan defended cutbacks on social spending. "We’re in a moment where if government’s growth is left unchecked and unchallenged, America’s best century will be considered our past century," Ryan said. "This is a future in which we will transform our social safety net into a hammock, which lulls able-bodied people into lives of complacency and dependency." For more, we speak with two experts on Social Security: independent journalist Eric Laursen, author of the book "The People’s Pension: The Struggle to Defend Social Security Since Reagan," and Heather McGhee, vice president of policy and outreach at the progressive policy group Demos and co-author of a chapter on retirement insecurity in the book "Inequality Matters: The Growing Economic Divide in America and its Poisonous Consequences."
