Obama Administration making plans to take over the 401(k)s to bail out their union backers

Unionized labor is looting from us. Plans to take over our 401K- private retirement funds. Communists did the same in Argentina, sized private pension funds.

The Obama Administration is making plans to take over the nation’s 401(k)s in order to bail out their union backers and their bankrupted pension plans.

In February, the White House released its “Annual Report on the Middle Class” containing new regulations favored by Big Labor including a bailout of critically underfunded union pension plans through “retirement security” options.

The radical solution most favored by Big Labor is the seizure of private 401(k) plans for government disbursement — which lets them off the hook for their collapsing retirement scheme. And, of course, the Obama administration is eager to accommodate their buddies. Vice President Joe Biden floated the idea, called “Guaranteed Retirement Accounts” (GRAs), in the February “Middle Class” report.

In conjunction with the report’s release, the Obama administration jointly issued through the Departments of Labor and Treasury a “Request for Information” regarding the “annuitization” of 401(k) plans through “Lifetime Income Options” in the form of a notice to the public of proposed issuance of rules and regulations. (pdf)

Republican Leader John Boehner released this statement today in response to this recent move by democrats:

House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and members of the House GOP Savings Solutions Group sent a letter to Labor Secretary Hilda Solis and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner warning the Obama Administration that the government should keep its hands off of the retirement savings of Americans, and should reject proposals that would dismantle or nationalize the private 401(k) system in favor of a government-run retirement security regime. Several Administration officials, including the Vice President, have voiced support for efforts to create so-called “Guaranteed Retirement Accounts” or impose new government mandates which would undermine 401(k) retirement savings plans and jeopardize employers’ willingness to continue offering them to their workers. Boehner issued the following statement:

“The American people are asking ‘where are the jobs?’ They aren’t asking for job-killing policies that jeopardize their retirement savings. Unfortunately, Washington Democrats are pursuing policies that make it more difficult to offer 401(k) savings plans to their workers, and some are even advocating replacing them with government-run accounts and ending 401(k)s altogether. That’s unacceptable and not the solution Americans need at a time when they are still rebuilding their retirement, college, and personal savings.

“Republicans are committed to offering better solutions, and the proposal we have offered – the Savings Recovery Act – will help restore Americans’ savings and ensure that Washington does not stand in the way of families’ ability to save more. It’s time for Democrats to stop advocating policies that will destroy Americans’ savings and work with Republicans on better solutions to help rebuild them.”

Several GOP House members signed on to a letter delivered to labor Secretary Hilda L. Solis and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner expressing their concerns today.

We must watch now for new bail-outs to unionized labor or dictatorship = communism.

Defend our Constitution. Defend Capitalism and terminate unionized labor from government.

Unionized labor is the same like monopoly power, taking maximum profits at other peoples expense , prosperity, liberty and life.

Unions must be terminated from government. They are not legal. They should exist only in private industry to protect only basic rights of workers.

General Motor was destroyed by Union's inability to compete with other competitors.

Government prepares to seize private pension. What else did you expect from socialist and communists?

Paul Joseph Watson Infowars.com October 12, 2010

The government is preparing to seize the private 401(k) pensions of millions of Americans while enforcing an additional 5 per cent payroll tax as part of a new bailout program that will empower the Social Security Administration to redistribute pension funds in a frightening example of big government gone wild.

Public pension plans have been so aggressively looted already by the government that cities and counties face a $574 billion funding gap, according to a CNBC report.

That black hole is set to be filled by a new proposal that will “fairly” distribute taxpayer-funded pensions to everyone, by confiscating the private wealth of millions of Americans. Its proponents express staggering arrogance in thinking that they can just steal money people have worked for decades to accrue as if it’s their own.

Not only would the government confiscate 401(k) pensions, it would also impose a mandatory 5 per cent payroll tax payable by everyone, according to a hearing chaired last week by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee.

“This would, of course, be a sister government ponzi scheme working in tandem with Social Security, the primary purpose being to give big government politicians additional taxpayer funds to raid to pay for their out-of-control spending,” writes Connie Hair.

The hearing was a platform for advocates of Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs), a program authored by Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York. Back in November 2008, Ghilarducci testified to Congress that 401(k)s and IRAs should be confiscated and converted into universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.

“You don’t hold hearings on something you don’t intend to do,” points out the Market Ticker blog. “I hate it when I’m right. I hate it even more when tens of millions of Americans are going to get reamed to pay for the crimes of the handful on Wall Street, and their crony enablers in Washington DC.”

The GRAs would be enforced by means of a mandatory savings tax equating to 5 per cent of an individual’s annual paycheck deposited to the GRA. Social Security and Medicare taxes would still be payable, employers would no longer would be able to write off their contributions and capital gains would be taxable year-on-year. In addition, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts.

During a Seattle radio interview in October 2008, Ghilarducci explained the motive behind the plan, stating, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading – spreading the wealth” (emphasis mine).

However, as we painfully learned in the immediate aftermath of the original $700 million dollar bailout, which was originally sold on the basis that it would be used to pay off bad debt, governments that propose “spreading the wealth” under socialist-style financial reforms almost always collect the wealth under the pretext of being the saviors before greedily hoarding it all for themselves.

The GRA program is being pushed by the Economic Policy Institute, an organization housed on the third floor of the building occupied by the George Soros-funded Center for American Progress. The Center for American Progress is a think tank headed by Bill Clinton’s former chief of staff John D. Podesta, who was also head of Barack Obama’s presidential transition team after the 2008 election.

In preparing to seize private pensions, the United States is going the same way as Argentinean government, which in 2008 nationalized the country’s private pension plans, known as AFJPs, confiscating the wealth of millions.

“We have no doubt that here the right to private property is being violated. Not just for us but for society and the world, this is a clear confiscation,” said opposition Radical Party’s Ernesto Sanz at the time.

How will Americans react to having not only their wealth but their nest egg for future generations brazenly confiscated by the government in one fell swoop? If this doesn’t prompt widespread rioting and civil disobedience in America on behalf of the besieged middle class then nothing will.

Don’t be under any illusions, if you don’t have a private pension and think this won’t affect you – think again. Once the pretext has been created that the state can simply confiscate privately earned wealth, they can then come after anything, your gold, your home, your kids and eventually your very freedom. Once the vampire of big government gets a taste for blood, the teeth will only sink in further, and America’s resemblance to third world tyrannies will rapidly accelerate.

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