[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2005, Book I)]
[March 30, 2005]
[Pages 525-529]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
Interview With WHO Radio in Cedar Rapids, Iowa
March 30, 2005
Social Security Reform
Jan Mickelson. The President probably
wants to get in on this conversation. [Laughter] It's an honor seeing
you again, sir.
The President. How are you doing?
Mr. Mickelson. I'm doing great. You
realize what a risk you've done, latching on to this Social Security
thing? You put our number one Senator at grave risk. [Laughter] He had
to burn his AARP card. [Laughter] Do you realize what a cheap buzzard
that guy is? [Laughter]
The President. No, I remember the ads with the lawnmower. [Laughter]
Mr. Mickelson. Well, see, he can't use his
AARP discount anywhere anymore. He had to burn that card.
The President. Well, you know, I appreciate the chairman. He's got some political courage, which is
necessary to take on tough problems. It's pretty easy to ignore problems
in politics. What's hard is to take on a tough problem. And both Senator
Grassley and I have dedicated ourselves to taking on the tough problem
of Social Security, and it is a problem.
Mr. Mickelson. I was also warned by the
Secret Service to keep the microphone away from you in a diner
situation--[laughter]--because you have a karaoke gland that breaks out
into Alan Jackson songs at the drop of a hat. Try to restrain yourself
this morning, sir. [Laughter]
The President. Thank you very much. If you've ever heard me sing,
you know it's not an issue. [Laughter]
Mr. Mickelson. I think it was the minority
leader, Harry Reid, said, ``Social Security is a real crisis that exists
only in one place, in the minds of Republicans.'' How would you respond
to that?
The President. Well, I would say that there's been a lot of people
who aren't Republicans who've looked at this issue and have said the
world has changed and is changing and that we have a problem for younger
generations of Americans. The Social Security trust, for example--or the
trustees came out with a report recently that said, ``In 2017, the
Social Security trust goes into the negative. In 2041, it is flat
broke.''
And the reason why is because baby boomers, like me and you, are
getting ready to retire, and there's a lot of us, and we're living
longer.
Mr. Mickelson. What have you heard? I
mean, I wasn't planning on retiring. [Laughter]
The President. Well, this isn't forced retirement. [Laughter] You
get to be retirement age whether you want to or not.
Mr. Mickelson. I'm still in denial about
that.
The President. Well, I'm afraid we're headed there. But there's a
lot of us, and we've been promised greater benefits, and there's fewer
workers. So you've got more people getting greater benefits, living
longer, and fewer people paying into the system. And it's just not going
to work. And so I think one of the things that's happened, in this 60-
day period that we set out to explain to the country we have a problem,
is that people are now beginning to understand there is a problem.
And the second thing that people are beginning to figure out is that
if you're 55 and over, you don't have anything to worry about; the
Government is going to pay the promised benefits. And that's an
important thing for people to understand. There's a lot of people in
Iowa counting on their Social Security check, and they just need to hear
the truth, and the truth is----
Mr. Mickelson. Five hundred and sixty-two
thousand of us.
[[Page 526]]
The President. That's a lot of you--not ``us.'' You're not one yet.
Mr. Mickelson. Well, there's 562,000
Iowans that receive some kind of Social Security benefit, and 2 out of 5
Americans do.
The President. That's right, and that's why it's an important
program. That's why it's important to reassure those who receive a
check, nothing changes. The people who need to worry about this issue
are the younger Americans. They're the ones who are going to have to pay
enormous taxes or get enormous benefit cuts if this Government is not
willing to respond now. And so, to answer the question of the skeptics,
we do have a serious problem.
Mr. Mickelson. The red State division and
blue State division affects this debate extremely importantly and
efficiently. The Democrats are marketing their opposition to any kind of
Social Security reform in the following way. I was up on their web site,
and this is how they describe the nature of their opposition. And they
have four different categories--they say women, blacks, Hispanics, and
the disabled all receive a progressive return from Social Security. They
get more than they pay in. In essence, they say, you'd be an idiot,
therefore, to go along with any kind of reform, because they have it
pretty good now, by comparison, paying a little in--or less in than
other wage earners. So why should we vote for something that, in
essence, we think might disenfranchise us?
The President. Well, again, nothing changes if you're 55 years and
older. I mean, the progressivity in the system stays in the system.
Plus, you can make the system progressive for your younger workers. But
a younger worker, whether they live in a blue State or a red State,
ought to be wondering whether or not the Congress has got the will
necessary to fix this problem, because if we don't, the system starts
going into the red, negative, in 2017.
Do you realize, in 2027, the cost just to make good on the promises
is going to be over $200 billion a year? It gets worse every year from
2017 to 2041. And so there's a huge hole that can only be filled by
dramatic benefit reductions and/or payroll increases. It's estimated
that in order to fix the problem if we wait, it will--payroll taxes will
have to get up to 18 percent. And that's unsatisfactory, as far as I'm
concerned. And younger workers, blue State, red State, need to worry
about this problem.
Now, older Americans do not. And I keep saying that, because I know
there's some propaganda out there that says to older Americans, ``You
know, old Grassley and Bush are going to take away your check.'' Well,
I've heard this before, every time I've run for office. Nothing changes.
The Government will keep its promise for those of us over 55 years old.
It's younger people. This is a generational issue, Jan, because many grandparents are now beginning to realize
they're going to get their check, and they're starting to ask the
question, ``What about my grandchildren; what are you going to do about
the grandchildren,'' because this is a serious problem.
Mr. Mickelson. I really appreciate the
phrase you use, the ``ownership society.''
The President. Yes.
Mr. Mickelson. That really works. Now, how
do we get the people who view themselves as recipients to see themselves
as potential owners, so they don't feel threatened by a transformation
of the system that you have in mind?
The President. Yes, well, first of all, you're referring to the
personal savings account aspect of a solution. And the reason I believe
it's important to encourage--or to allow younger workers, if they so
choose, to set aside some of their own money in a personal savings
account is threefold. One, they will get a better rate of return on
their money than they're going to get if the Government holds it for
them. In other words, in a conservative mix of bonds and stocks held
over time, the rate of return on the money, the growth of the
[[Page 527]]
money, the fact that it's going to be growing in a compounded way is
going to be greater.
Mr. Mickelson. Even if they haven't paid in as much, initially, to
push them into that progressive recipient category in which they now
exist?
The President. Well, you can do both. First of all, it's more
progressive, by the way, if you get a greater rate of return on your
money than if you don't. But you can also make sure the benefits that
end up being determined by Congress--in other words, the benefits that
the Government can afford--they're progressive in nature as well.
But progressivity really depends upon how the benefit structure is
decided by Congress. We've got some money for some benefits; we just
don't have enough to pay the promises made to younger workers. And the
best way to allow a younger worker to more approximate that which the
Government has promised is to let them earn a better rate of return on
their money.
Secondly, I like the idea of somebody owning something. I mean,
there is kind of this mindset that only a certain investor class can
manage their own money. I think that's a preposterous assumption. I
think everybody ought to be encouraged to manage their own money.
And thirdly, we do this, Jan--this is a
very important point--this isn't a novel idea. Federal workers get to do
this in what's called--in the Federal employee program, retirement
program. They get to take some of their own money and set it aside so
they get a better rate of return than that which the Government can get
for them. And Senator Grassley's employees get to do that; people
working for the Agriculture Department get to do it. My attitude, if
it's good enough for Federal employees, it ought to be good enough for
younger workers.
Mr. Mickelson. Federal Reserve Chairman
Alan Greenspan keeps using another very powerful word describing much of
our social safety net, ``unsustainable.''
The President. Yes.
Mr. Mickelson. We can't do it.
Demographically, as you mentioned earlier, we aren't reproducing
ourselves.
The President. Right.
Medicare/Healthcare Savings Accounts
Mr. Mickelson. The same logic that you
applied aptly to Social Security also applies to our medical delivery
system.
The President. That's right.
Mr. Mickelson. Can we also move to the
ownership concept in that, in medical IRAs, and make those universal,
maybe using medical IRA vouchers? And how about using the earned-income
tax that lower income people get and empower a savings account, so they
get an ownership concept using their money in that regard?
The President. That's a very good point. As a matter of fact, the
Senator and I worked on Medicare reform. We wanted the current system to
work better for those people who are going to get--that are on Medicare.
We wanted--for example, I think there's a lot of benefit to have a
prescription drug plan available in Medicare because a lot of people
will be able to avoid major surgery by taking prescription drugs. In
other words, Medicare would pay for heart surgery but not a dime for the
prescription drugs that might prevent the heart surgery from being
needed in the first place. So we modernized Medicare and, by the way,
took care of rural hospitals in Iowa as we did so.
Secondly, though, in that bill is the notion of health savings
accounts, which provides an IRA-type approach, as you mentioned, to
encourage people to set aside money on a tax-free basis so they get to
make the decisions for their own health care--in other words, own their
own health care plan. And it's a great idea that is now beginning to
take hold with a lot of small businesses and a lot of employees for
small businesses.
[[Page 528]]
Thirdly, I've consistently proposed, Jan,
that we have tax credits for the working poor people so that they,
themselves, can go in the marketplace and own their own account. And
yes, so to answer your question, absolutely, we can extend ownership.
Mr. Mickelson. So they earn--they keep the
time value of their own money.
The President. Precisely.
Mr. Mickelson. That's the chief weakness
of the current system.
The President. On a tax-free basis, with the HSAs, by the way.
Social Security Reform
Mr. Mickelson. The birth-dearth issue that
you made reference to, that's the elephant in the room. We have to
address that. Our culture is not--it's not the first time this has
happened. I was reading--Teddy Roosevelt addressed this in the early
part of the century, dealing with the birth dearth in the last century,
and he saw that that generation of Americans were not reproducing
themselves. And do you want to hear a really snotty quote from Teddy
Roosevelt? He said----
The President. I don't have much choice. [Laughter]
Mr. Mickelson. Yes, you do. You have the Executive order. [Laughter]
It says, ``If you do not believe in your own stock enough to wish to
see the stock kept up, then you're not good Americans, and you're not
patriots. I, for one, would not mourn your extinction, and in such
event, I would welcome the advent of a new race that would take your
place, because you will have shown that you are not even fit to cumber
the ground.''
So that's pretty--that's a bully pulpit.
The President. He was a colorful person. [Laughter] That's what I've
been doing, using the bully pulpit over the last weeks to remind people
we have a problem. And it's easy in politics to ignore problems. It's
just easy to say, ``Well, there's no problem.'' But this is a serious
problem for younger generations of Americans, and I believe there is a
duty as the President--and fortunately, Senator Grassley believes there's a duty as the chairman of the
Finance Committee in the Senate--to take on problems and not pass them
on. See, the easy route is to say, ``Well, we really don't have a
problem.'' But what's going to end up happening is, in 2017, people are
going to show up to work, and they're going to realize their payroll
taxes have gone up significantly to pay for promises that the Government
has made.
And so I'm saying to people, now is the time to fix it. And I think
there's a political price for not getting involved in the process. I
think there's a political price for saying, ``It's not a problem. I'm
going to stay away from the table.'' So in my State of the Union Address
I called upon Members of Congress, both parties, to bring good ideas
forward.
Mr. Mickelson. Has the third rail moved?
The President. I think it has. I think you'd made a mistake not
addressing Social Security. I think the American people, when they
figure out how significant this problem is--and they're beginning to
figure it out--are then going to demand, from both Republicans and
Democrats, leadership.
And I am--I love this--I love taking on big issues, because I think
that's my job. I think that's why the people of the country put me in
office. They expect a President to lead, and they expect a chairman of
the Finance Committee to lead as well. And fortunately, the good State
of Iowa has got such a man in Charles Grassley. I'm looking forward to working with him on this issue.
Mr. Mickelson. Can I expect that in an
upcoming press conference that you're attending that you will get up and
address the Nation and tell the population of the United States, ``Get
out there and reproduce, or don't cumber the ground?'' [Laughter]
The President. No, you can't expect that. [Laughter]
[[Page 529]]
Mr. Mickelson. ``Get off the--have some
more kids or get off the planet.'' [Laughter]
The President. You can expect me to keep talking about Social
Security. [Laughter] You can expect it because now is the time to solve
this problem. And I repeat to the grandparents out there that if we do
not act, your grandchildren are going to be saddled with a huge burden.
This Government has made promises it cannot keep. It'll keep the
promises to those of us over 55 years old, but it has made promises to a
lot of younger Americans it cannot keep, and now is the time to solve
the problem.
And I'm going to keep working with Members of Congress from both
political parties to do our duty. And I like traveling the country. I
like coming to the great State of Iowa--been here quite a few times and
may have to come back to keep pounding on the issue, but it is the right
thing to do, which is to address problems.
Mr. Mickelson. Mr. President, thank you
for visiting Iowa.
The President. Thanks for coming over.
Mr. Mickelson. Thank you for visiting us. Senator Grassley, thank
you for gracing us.
Senator Grassley. Pleasure to be
with you.
Mr. Mickelson. Thank you for being here.
Note: The interview began at 11:18 a.m. at the Spring House Family
Restaurant and was broadcast live on the ``Mickelson in the Morning''
program.