politics

A Social Security Crib Sheet for Tonight

February 2, 2005

President Bush takes center stage tonight to deliver the State of the Union address, and the word on the street is that he will finally spell out some details of his plan to change the Social Security system.

The Bush team revved up its public relations campaign last December to sell to the nation its plans to revamp Social Security. The campaign — and it is a campaign — has received mixed reactions from the press, at times running into a wall of criticism, and in other instances succeeding in passing its message along unchallenged. Last year an estimated 43.4 million Americans tuned in to listen to the president’s speech. This year the press will face the task/challenge of dissecting the president’s rhetoric and proposals to an equal if not greater number of viewers.

In that spirit we offer our list of things to watch out for that both press and public should be aware of during the broadcast. Think of it as a CJR Daily crib sheet.

Up until this point the Bush administration’s PR blitz has been centered on specific buzzwords used to frame the debate around phraseology that polls well with the public. (We’re not kidding; this is a sales job, just as surely as if the president were selling a controversial new car model, and choosing precisely the right word, as opposed to the almost-right word, can make instead of break the deal.) So let’s look at a few magic and not-so-magic words.

“Crisis” vs. “Problem”

Back in December when Bush first started talking about Social Security, he hyped the long-term dilemma facing the system into a “crisis,” implying a problem that had come to a head. Unfortunately for Bush, newshounds never bought that, and after a period of pushback from the press, Bush and his aides began to redefine Social Security’s purported ills as a “problem.”

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Unless there’s a reversal of course, tonight Bush will talk about the eventual shortfalls built into the Social Security system as a “problem.” But it’s worth pointing out that some television commentators, behind the curve as always, still invoke the “crisis” rhetoric when speaking about the program.

“Private” vs. “Personal” vs. “Individual”

CJR Daily has detailed the “war of words” that has erupted over exactly what to call the investment accounts central to President Bush’s proposed Social Security overhaul. For years, proponents of investment accounts used the term “private accounts” or “private investment accounts” to describe what they had in mind, and eventually that became the accepted term in the media. But after learning that “private accounts” polled poorly, the Bush administration issued a directive to its minions that “personal accounts” was the preferred nomenclature. As we’ve written, while both terms accurately describe the accounts, there’s no reason for the press to take its cues from polling numbers. Thus, it will be interesting tonight to see, after President Bush repeatedly refers to “personal accounts,” whether the press will play along with the nomenclature of choice or refer to “private accounts” or “individual investment accounts.”

“Transition Costs” vs. “Prepay”

This is a new one. The transition cost — estimated at $1-2 trillion — refers to the money that must be put into the Social Security system to make up for the tax dollars that would be diverted into private accounts instead of going to pay current retirees. Last Friday, Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) said that he preferred the term “prepay” instead of “transitional” costs. Whatever you call it, the $1-2 trillion is the real cost of making the transition to private accounts, and there’s no reason for the media to sugarcoat that.

As we’ve noted before, language can mask meaning. But as we’ve also noted, ample context can fight through rhetoric to offer an accurate assessment of the issue at hand. For example: It can be argued that the word “problem” is, in its own way, as much of an overstatement as the word “crisis” in discussing the fiscal state of the Social Security system. While the president has told audiences that the current Social Security system will go “bankrupt” in 2042 — an exaggeration he may repeat tonight — it is imperative that those covering the speech remind viewers that Social Security cannot go “bankrupt” in the generally understood sense of the term.

Ideally, after tonight’s broadcast the debate over “personal” vs. “private” should be secondary to discussions that outline the purpose of the investment accounts. For, as even the president’s allies in this debate acknowledge, diverting money to private investment accounts is, in itself, not a solution to the eventual shortfalls the Social Security system faces. Rather, private accounts are part of something more ambitious — the president’s vision for an “ownership” society, in which individuals, not government, take responsibility for their own savings plans and investment choices. In a sense, this is an attempt 70 years after the fact to partly roll back the most ambitious element of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. (By contrast, to solve Social Security’s fiscal problems, sooner or later, either taxes withheld from paychecks will have to be raised or benefits for future generations will have to be cut, or some combination of the two.)

Beyond that, very few of us can grasp the magnitude of numbers like $2 trillion, much less imagine what America might be like in 2052. Thus, it’s critical that coverage tonight help out by providing context. For instance, reporters should inform viewers how the “problems” built into the current Social Security system compare with, say, the more immediate problems of Medicare, or of our soaring national debt.

Furthermore, — and this is a point that has been almost entirely missed by the press up to now — the coverage should offer background on the various projections for when the Social Security system will be taking in less than it is paying out, and how long its accumulated surplus will last. These projections by the Social Security actuaries and the Congressional Budget Office have been thrown around like cold, hard fact for the last two months. But they are only projections.

At some point tonight, if past is precedent, the president will cite numbers computed by Social Security’s actuaries saying that in 2018 the trust fund will start paying out more than it takes in and/or by 2042 the trust fund will be depleted. While he has every right to cite those numbers, thorough coverage should take the time to note that the actuaries’ projections have been historically pessimistic. As Roger Lowenstein detailed a few weeks ago in The New York Times Magazine, Social Security’s actuaries offer three projections — optimistic, pessimistic, and intermediate. A study Lowenstein cites found that over a recent 10-year span the optimistic case turned out to be the most accurate. (The current most optimistic case for Social Security predicts that it will be solvent forever even without any changes in current rules.)

It might even be worth noting that in 1978, during a run for Congress, a young George W. Bush told voters that Social Security would be bankrupt in 10 years — an event that obviously did not occur. (Hey, this is the guy who traded Sammy Sosa.)

After tonight’s speech, the press should be there, ready to take the public through the “ins” and “outs” of Social Security. This stuff may seem tedious, but it’s not rocket science, and it’s the responsibility of reporters to cut through the rhetoric and provide the context necessary to understand not just the details of the president’s proposal, but also the various alternatives.

In the best of all possible journalistic worlds, instead of “outside experts” sparring with administration-dispatched talking heads after the speech tonight, we would have platoons of reporters ready to take readers through the murk of rhetoric and onto the hills of clarity.

Plus enough Scotch and pistachios to get us through the night, of course.

–Thomas Lang

Thomas Lang was a writer at CJR Daily.