A Semi-open Letter to Two Clever Lads From Harvard Law School

Paris, August 8, 2015

The figures in this New York Times article are pretty crude, and The Times is not authoritative, but IF their figures are even roughly accurate, we are in deep trouble.  There are going to be a lot of elderly people in economic distress before long.  I am afraid that while the New York Times article offers a useful analysis, it offers no meaningful response to the impending crisis.  And if the present administration has a solution, neither Barry Obama nor Eric Holder ever made a serious effort to enact it.   Social Democratic theorist, Cornell West offers no practicable solution — only mean-sprited carping, although I suppose his negativism does strike a chord.   Since Lyndon Johnson, who had at least one eye open, every subsequent government has had its head in the sand, with the possible exception of Jimmy Carter’s.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/business/americans-arent-saving-enough-for-retirement-but-one-change-could-help.html

Another point: – I think it is almost likely that Social Security will be modified beyond recognition, before it sees its 100^th anniversary.  Medicare will be abolished, and Obamacare costs will skyrocket due to insurance company monopolies.  What this means is that masses of people will be without adequate income and lacking medical insurance by the time I reach ninety.

The person who has unencumbered net assets of 4 or 5 million dollars may feel secure, until banks and mutual funds start collapsing.  And how secure can anyone be when organized gangs start kidnapping people and demanding ransoms?  This sort of crime is already rampant in Mexico and Brazil.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Brazil  With a real social and economic breakdown, even poor people could be extorted out of their meager Social Security income, presuming that they have any such income.

The social contract, referred to by the  French and Germans as “Solidarity,” never existed in America, except perhaps in the dreams of Thomas Paine.   In America rights come from God, not from the social contract.  At least that is what Thomas Jefferson thought, as he reclined on his pillows, and Sally Hemings poured him another glass of imported French wine from his $30,000 wine cellar.