European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 8, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes wednesday january 8, 1986 James Kilpatric Mes . Britain getting a head Start on better social Security i Tiik new Var begins let me venture a single is w via t m single forecast Oik of these years nut one of these Day Contr Chi ill move toward a phasing Oul of social Security and inward a phasing in or private programs to protect us in our retirement years. This is an idea whose Lime will come. This won t Maic Rioli a in 1936. It May be a decade or Mure. Eventually political considerations will compel Congress to offer Young workers just entering the labor Force a better option than social Security far their senior pc Iris this Phi Bini in won t affect the 3fi million persons now receiving social Security benefits their benefits will be fully protected. Neither will it affect those workers new in their Laic 40s and mid ids. They will get everything now promised to them. The privatisation a dreadful word will offer an Opportunity to my grandchildren. It is their future Thul concerns me Here. These thoughts arc set in motion in part by an essay by Peter Young executive director of the adm Smith Institute in the . His article released by the heritage foundation deals with pending proposals for a gradual privatization of a part of great Britain s social Security program. What is going on there is a portent of what will happen Here. Our program and the British program have much in common. Both retirement systems operate under in illusion and a reality. The illusion is that some nebulous Trust fund protects future benefits the reality is that in both nations the systems arc virtually pay As we go. Tuxes come in benefits go out. Both nations Bixik to i lie same demographic future we will have More old folks receiving benefits and we will have fewer Young people paying social Security taxes. By the turn of the Century just 15 years hence one of every five americans will be More than 65 years old. A political War is coming. We have known these in lie past Between free states and slave suites Between farm and City Between protective tariffs and the doctrines of free Trade. The impending political War will be Between Young and old. The relatively Young who will be paying monstrous punitive taxes on their wages will be rebelling against financing benefits for their parents and grandparents. They will demand an alternative for themselves. Garcal Britain is putting out feelers in just this direction. Over the years our cousins have created u supplement to their Basic retirement program. It now is possible for British workers to opt out of a part of the social Security taxes hey otherwise would pay. They and their employers May instead Pei Kirtio unproved private pension plans. It is a complicated procedure but roughly half if All eligible British workers have chosen to take the option. The transition has Hud no effect on present Day Reti ree. Their benefits have not been reduced in any Way. William Safire predict Basfor i predict Tost i  Star i cemetery  Poms eos is every pension entitlement will be honoured. Neither will the program harm those workers who already Are close to retirement men Over 50 and women Over 45 will continue under the present system. Over a three year period if the plan gains parliamentary acceptance younger workers would move toward paying 4 per can of heir wages matched by employers into private pension programs to supplement the Basic benefits. It makes sense. As Peter Young observes in his essay the plan would create vast new pools of private capital for economic development it would serve the cause of personal Liberty by giving workers greater flexibility in planning their own retirement. Each of these super Ira accounts would be a valuable personal Asili a worker s fund balance would accompany him from Job to Job on his death the worker would have something tangible to leave to his family. The system of private pensions advocated by Young is essentially the same system Long advocated by Peter j. Per Rara who writes for the Cato Institute both Economy is believe that private pension programs arc philosophically and financially Superior to governmental programs Epp scially for Blacks who tend to die sooner than whiles or frail. Retirement plans offer tremendous advantages the British plan which Calls for a 20-year phasing in a of supplementary benefits would harm no present real \ rce. It would greatly Benefit relic is of the next cell airy ,. Great Britain is now actively engaged in debate on Nifte proposition. Our Congress will not even Grant hearings ?. On Ferrara s ideas. As i concede the Lime for his Ideal ,. Has not come. Believe me in will come. C 19 5 a Alvinal Gnu a Villak. Greed is finally getting its recognition As a virtue 0 greed you have never had a decent press. For centuries Yea millennia you have been blacklisted As one of the seven sins usually under the names of avarice or  that Lead to the death of the spirit. 1 Hoid no Brief for anger envy lust gluttony Pride or sloth certainly not sloth All worthy objects of St. Gregory s Wrath when he jotted Down the list in the year 600. However in the Light of a strange new turn the world is taking the time has come for a re examination of the Case against greed with 3 View toward its Deisting. Greed is a hunger for  moral philosophers have characterized this natural human urge to accumulate the accoutrement of the Good life or at least the comfortable life As a slavering grasp for More than one s share. Implicit in this derogation of greed is the idea that everyone should have the same portion of worldly goods and ii is morally corrupt to want to snatch away the other Guy s Little pile. Along came Karl Marx exploding the Universal Knock put on greed by promising to divvy everything up so that nobody would have More than the next Guy. But wherever his followers have put this anti greed notion into practice most people s Little pile of food dwindled. For 7s years commissars in Moscow have been blaming the weather for tace need to import food from countries where greed is the driving Force of the eco nomic system. But nature is not to blame the fault lies in denying human nature. As a result of he repeated failures of the greed Bash ers consider Whyl is happening in the world in China where the redistribution schemes of Mao led to inline and depression and misdirected energies a Stu Rcd Flowers of Prosperity Are beginning to Bloom the reason is that peasants have been permitted to let greed determine Ihetu work output and this self serving idea apologized for As socialism with chinese characteristics will if there is no great leap backward allow a billion individuals to support themselves in Britain where a powerful socialist labor move ment led the nation into the welfare state and near bankruptcy Union members from the Coal mines to feet Street Are undercutting their ideological leaders. State owned companies and utilities Are going private again a the Man in the Street has come to understand that it is More blessed to produce than to distribute. In France the socialists came to Power nationalized the Banks and put the controlled Economy through a wringer in n few years the socialists had to Back track madly in Hopes of staying in Power and now the Nouveau economists Are demanding abolishment of state ownership reduction of taxes and state services Raissez a e24"0" Tysl a of nechnian coined the term even in Russia where enforced Equality is still espoused at least a theory while a new class has risen to ride Herd on the avarice of the worker talk of Reform is in the air. In Pom. Where the state buses run few and far Between the buses Are being sold to the bus Drivers if such an Experiment in Enterprise works in Georgia a great Many card carrying party members freezing in lonely bus slops arc going to be glad to let avaricious Drivers make a profit. In this cauldron of boiling change what Cooks greed is finally being recognized As a virtue. Dressed in euphemism the profit motive or growth incentives or the entrepreneurial spirit our nol to deadly sin turns out to be the Best engine of betterment known to Man. The world has Learned that la concentrate on dewy ing up diminishes us All while scrambling to help our selves helps others without greed there is no wherewithal for generosity. By hustling to improve our station by indulging the desire for necessities that becomes a lust for luxuries by competing to make our pile bigger to engage in in great invisible handshake thai enlarges pics lifts Oil boats and enriches us without impoverishing our neigh Bor. The Hoot of the word greed is hunger and tic cure for world hunger is the driving Force of greed. A Rovern meals can enforce limits and moralists Tail Urie moderation i recognize there can be too much of i Good Ihms but Only a Hearty Welcome to the de mands of the truly greedy can insure ample Supply forthe truly needy. Of we re Down to six deadly sins. In a world in which so Many suffer from Lack of self esteem anybody want to take a crack at Pride to How a a Tomas