I need info on Soc Security problems in Argentina & Britain

[NewJeffCT]

I know both countries had major economic problems after they tried to privatize Social Security. Can anybody give me a good summary via a link? I suck at googling.

Thanks

[elehhhhna]

1. also look at Chile

[joeybee12]

2. Go to the NY Times site--search Paul Krugman's old columns--he's done

some stuff on that--probably has some information in the columsn where you can find more.

[papau]

3. Google Andy Lang actuary - he has spoken out on these topics.

My posts at DU give a view from 30,000 feet - but I suspect you need real detail - at least more detail than I drag up from memory.

For the record Chile is a disaster with the economic activity and lower gov deficit much more than offset by the loss of capital in pointless spending for institutions to acquire accounts, and by the safety net being in sheds as participation is near zero for the non- middle/upper classes - plus the gov is now giving out guarantees that it does not fund and can not afford - it would be much better off with our pay as you go Soc Sec system).

Britain is in the process of trying to end the Thatcher safety net cut of 1/3 (60% of retirement income from the gov was the pre Thatcher ratio to 40% now - and Blair is trying to move back to 60% so as to restore the safety net for the lower middle class and poor).

As for Argentina - well - the don't raise tax crowd - plus the privatized account crap has led to folks asking how many cents on a dollar they can get for those great government bonds that had the full faith and credit of the nation behind them.

[NewJeffCT]

4. actually

I was looking a bit more for the bird's eye view, just maybe not one from 30,000 feet.

good stuff from Lang, though.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Blair is trying to move back to 60% income from government?

That's news to me. The general trend is still towards privately held pensions for anything above the bare minimum. The current system has an insanely complicated state 'second pension' from which no-one knows how much they'll get until the moment they retire. You can opt out of this, if you want - but since you don't know how much you'll get from it, it's all a big gamble. There does seem to be a general desire to get rid of the 'means tested' nature of some of the government pension - which discourages those of modest means doing any saving for their retirement.

Here's an article with an overview. Note that the UK is saying "we wish we had your problems, America"; and that the push towards lots of private pension plans produced a scandal of dodgy salesmen promising far better benefits than reality.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/12/07/business/pension.html