The solvency and sustainability of Social Security, when and if it requires shoring up, will have to be dealt with the old-fashioned way: by increasing revenue and/or reducing guaranteed benefits.
GE Capital, which bought Toho Mutual (now GE Edison Life) in 2000, has probably got back half its ¥240 billion investment.Insurers are also making juicy profits on remaining policies, not only by reducing guaranteed rates of return but also by cutting costs and updating assumed mortality rates.
There are signs that Mr. Chertoff will face resistance, particularly in Congress, where several senators have criticized him for a plan to reduce guaranteed minimum antiterrorism grants for smaller, more rural states.
Using the same type of calculation, they said, Mr. Bush's plan would require $57 trillion between 2023 and 2054 to keep the system solvent, unless Mr. Bush was willing to reduce guaranteed benefit payments or increase the payroll tax.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee attacked Mrs. Dole on Social Security, saying her support for workers' investing part of their payroll taxes in the stock market "would reduce guaranteed benefits for retirees".
More specifically, the programme tried to achieve two objectives: (1) increase employment and (2) reduce (guaranteed) DI benefits.
Nearly all personal account proposals also involve reducing the guaranteed benefit going to retirees, under the assumption that any cut would be at least offset by gains from the investment account.
To pay for the accounts and to put the system on sound footing, they said they would propose reducing the guaranteed benefit, especially for middle- and upper-income workers, increasing the level of earnings subject to the Social Security payroll tax and reducing cost-of-living adjustments.
One way the United States is pressing Israel is by threatening to reduce loan guarantees by whatever sum Israel spends on expanding the barrier or the West Bank settlements.
The president ignored a question about whether he would reduce loan guarantees to Israel to try to persuade the Israelis to stop construction of the barrier.
