Social Security False Alarm?

By Dean Baker

Created 01/09/2009 - 9:42am

The headline of a New York Times article tells readers that "Obama Promises Bid to Overhaul Retiree Spending." The first sentence warns that "overhauling Social Security and Medicare would be 'a central part' of his administration’s efforts to contain federal spending, signaling for the first time that he would wade into the thorny politics of entitlement programs."

This certainly makes it appear as though President-elect Obama intends to use the Wall Street-generated crisis as a pretext for cutting Social Security.