Letter: It’s becoming every man for himself

Wednesday, May 17, 2006 | 7:32 a.m.

John Hall's May 15 commentary, "Business has hand in Social Security crisis," touches on why "security" should never be exchanged for the "speculation" of today's markets. Hall decries Social Security to be in crisis and assumes a $450 billion shortfall in Pension Benefit Guarantee Corp. liabilities a precursor to additional hidden government debt.

Then he makes sad a pauper's chance for incentives to save for retirement from lack of encouragement.

He lays all this at the door of corporate America's eagerness to shuck pension plans to ensure its own survival.

Better said, pension plans are made from the stuff that sinks business and nations alike. How lame the idea of guaranteeing such folly to begin with is now surfacing. And we have seen how surpluses accumulated through "overpaying in advance" our Social Security taxes have been squandered on everyday government excesses.

The red light is clearly on here and it is quickly becoming every man for himself, the new attitude for social responsibility. Forget about the mercy of the markets.

Perhaps eroding inflation and a declining currency have not shook us enough yet to yank everything that is ours now and convert it to gold buried in the back yard, but that day is rapidly approaching.

George Job, Henderson