Retirement Security

How to Prepare for the End of Social Security | U.S. News & World Report

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 10:32:00 -0400

... fastest-growing poverty group in the United States...so we're going to have to spend a lot of money on the elderly," says Phillip Longman, author of Born to Pay: The New Politics of Aging in America and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation.

The Right's Social Security Scare Tactics

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 19 May 2009 07:47:00 -0400

Let's Cut Social Security to Pay for Banker Bailouts!

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 12 May 2009 08:19:00 -0400

On Tuesday, May 12, the trustees who oversee Social Security and Medicare will issue their annual report. I don't know what will be in the report. But I do know what the response will be. Conservatives, libertarians and center-right Democrats will take whatever the report says as evidence that there is an "entitlement crisis," which should require us not only to address spiraling healthcare costs (a genuine issue, affecting the private sector as well as Medicare and Medicaid) but also the alleged "crisis" of Social Security (an imaginary problem).

Savings, Responsibility and Opportunity in America

Next Social Contract — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 20:09:00 -0400

When President Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, he changed the moral debate over poverty. No longer could Ronald Reagan's heirs wave help-wanted ads and ask sarcastically why those welfare queens couldn't find a job when there were so many to be had. Now everyone was working, training for a job, or looking for one. It was the law, after all. With benefits now linked to work, progressive politicians could have argued for a new type of social safety net.

Which Party Will Attract the Busted Boomers?

Cecille Isidro — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:40:00 -0400

While 2008 will go down as a year of hope and change in American politics, the collapse of Wall Street and bursting of the housing bubble will probably mean that fear and anger take center stage in the 2010 elections. If so, the most coveted swing voters may soon be the Busted Boomers - individuals 50 and older who placed supreme faith in the financial markets and now find their long-held dreams of a comfortable retirement eviscerated.

Obama's Timid Liberalism

Cecille Isidro — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 09:39:00 -0500

Barack Obama's bold, ambitious budget plan proves that he is the true heir of Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal. Consider Obama's Rooseveltian energy plan. In 1939, President Roosevelt decided to mobilize Americans to create a new source of energy: atomic power. Although he was urged to focus on government-funded R&D, FDR chose a different route. He wisely encouraged private capital to invest in atomic energy research by a variety of tax incentives. To make atomic power investment more palatable to private capital,

The End of the Ownership Society?

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 10:08:00 -0500

In his second inaugural address, President Bush offered a vision of an "ownership society"

It's Time to Fix the 401(k) | CNN Money

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 08:08:00 -0500

... designed to provide inadequate retirement income for the average worker," says University of California Berkeley political scientist Jacob Hacker. ...

It's Time to Fix the 401(k) | CNN

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 08:07:00 -0500

... designed to provide inadequate retirement income for the average worker," says University of California Berkeley political scientist Jacob Hacker. ...

Social Policy After the Economic Crisis

Cecille Isidro — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 14:45:00 -0500

A New America Event
12/05/2008 - 12:00pm

On December 5, 2008, the New America Foundation’s Next Social Contract Initiative hosted a three panel discussion about the future of social policy after the economic downturn. David Gray, Director of the Workforce and Family Program at New America, opened the event with preliminary remarks. Karen Kornbluh, formerly of the New America Foundation, policy director in the office of Senator Barack Obama and the primary author of the 2008 Democratic Party Platform, delivered the keynote address. She was followed by a series of