Over the years, I’ve shared many charts, graphs, and tables to help people understand that the welfare state is fundamentally unsustainable. And, assuming there’s not genuine entitlement reform, many of these fiscal estimates show that the United States has a very perilous future. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the United States is in worse shape […]

As part of his State-of-the-Union speech, President Obama announced he was going to unilaterally create a new retirement savings account that supposedly would be available to all workers. Employers would be mandated to facilitate these”MyRA” accounts, and the money collected would be invested in “guaranteed” government bonds. There are some good features to the MyRA plan, […]

America desperately needs genuine entitlement reform to avoid a Greek-style fiscal future. The biggest problems are the health entitlements such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Obamacare, but Social Security also has a huge long-run fiscal shortfall. That’s why I’m a big fan of the very successful reforms in places such as Chileand Australia, where personal accounts are producing big benefits for workers.These systems […]

I’m currently in the Faroe Islands, a relatively unknown and semi-autonomous part of Denmark located in the North Atlantic. Sort of like Greenland, but too small to appear on most maps. I’m in this chilly archipelago for a speech to the annual meeting of the Faroese People’s Party. According to Wikipedia, “the party is supportive […]

Most Western nations have huge long-run fiscal problems because of unfavorable demographics and misguided entitlement programs. That’s the bad news. The good news is that dozens of nations have fully or partially shifted to mandatory private savings as a pro-growth way of modernizing bankrupt tax-and-transfer Social Security systems. But good news in the short run […]

I’ve done a handful of TV debates on Social Security, including the time I said that I wished Republicans had a secret plan for personal retirement accounts. So I thought I was well prepared for this duel with a defender of the status quo on Fox Business Network. I generally think the debate went well, […]

I’m in Vienna, Austria, for the annual European Resource Bank meeting. I had the pleasure last night of listening to Jose Pinera speak about economic reform in Chile, particularly the system of personal retirement accounts. He shared a chart that conclusively shows why good economic policy makes a difference. Wow. Look at how much faster […]

One reason I’m so bullish on Australia is that the nation has a privatized Social Security system called “Superannuation,” with workers setting aside 9 percent of their income in personal retirement accounts (rising to 12 percent by 2020). Established almost 30 years ago, and made virtually universal about 20 years ago, this system is far […]

This is a tough question. I obviously want comprehensive reform of all entitlement programs, so selecting just one is a bit of a challenge. Sort of like being asked to pick your favorite kid. Would I reform Social Security? That’s a logical choice. It’s the biggest program in the federal budget, so it’s presumably the […]

Washington is filled with debate and discussion about the economic burden of the federal income tax, which collected $1.13 trillion in FY2012 ($1.37 trillion if you include the corporate income tax). Yet politicians rarely consider the economic impact of payroll taxes, even though these levies totaled $.85 trillion during the same fiscal year. Yes, we […]