Cato Daily Dispatch for October 4, 2004
Subscribe to the Daily Dispatch via email
Subscribe to the Daily Dispatch via PDA (AvantGo)
(Links to outside sources were active as of the date of this dispatch; however, not all news sources maintain links to current stories indefinitely. Some links also may require registration.)
Social Security Benefits Threatened for 'Greatest Generation'Supreme Court Hears Federal Sentencing Guidelines Case Today
Chicago Mayor: Small-Time Marijuana Cases a 'Colossal Waste of Time'
Social Security Benefits Threatened for 'Greatest Generation'
"The long-term economic health of the United States is threatened by $53 trillion in government debts and liabilities that start to come due in four years when baby boomers begin to retire," reports USA Today.
"The `Greatest Generation' and its baby-boom children have promised themselves [Social Security] benefits unprecedented in size and scope. Many leading economists say that even the world's most prosperous economy cannot fulfill these promises without a crushing increase in taxes -- and perhaps not even then."
In "The 6.2 Percent Solution: A Plan for Reforming Social Security," Michael Tanner, director of the Cato Project on Social Security Choice, proposes a plan that allows younger workers to invest their portion of the FICA payroll tax (6.2 percent) in individual accounts. The other 6.2 percentage points of payroll taxes, paid by employers, would be used to cover transition costs.
The Cato plan puts individuals, not the government, first. It protects younger workers and future generations. It puts each citizen in charge of his or her retirement. It allows workers to keep more of their own assets. As Tanner writes: "It would be a profound and significant increase in individual liberty."
Supreme Court Hears Federal Sentencing Guidelines Case Today
"The Supreme Court opens its new term on Monday faced with urgent business and looming uncertainty," reports the New York Times.
"The justices' most pressing task is to resolve the fate of the federal criminal sentencing system, which the court itself threw into limbo in June by declaring unconstitutional a similar, although not identical, system used by the state of Washington."
In "Misguided Guidelines: A Critique of Federal Sentencing," Erik Luna, an associate professor of law at the University of Utah, outlines how the congressionally mandated Federal Sentencing Guidelines undermine constitutional principles and produce unjust results.
"The guidelines have proven to be unfair and unworkable in practice," Luna writes. "Ultimately, Congress must end the Guidelines era and begin anew, guaranteeing that the next 15 years of federal punishment will not be like the last. It is time to scrap the [U.S. Sentencing Commission] and its Guidelines, and to embark on a new age of moral judgment in sentencing."
Chicago Mayor: Small-Time Marijuana Cases a 'Colossal Waste of Time'
"Mayor Richard Daley, a former prosecutor, runs the nation's third-largest city with a pragmatic, law-and-order style. So when he starts complaining about the colossal waste of time and money involved in prosecuting small-time marijuana cases, people take notice," reports USA Today.
"`This is absolutely a big deal,'said Andy Ko, director of the Drug Policy Reform Project for the American Civil Liberties Union in Washington state. `You've got a mayor in a major American city ... coming out in favor of a smart and fair and just drug policy.'"
In "Forget the War on Drugs Already," Doug Bandow, Cato senior fellow, writes: "Why government tosses pot smokers in jail while tolerating use of alcohol and cigarettes, far more dangerous substances by most measures, has never been obvious. There is good reason for people to abstain from all of them; there is no good reason to imprison them if people do not."
Jonathan Block, editor, jblock@cato.org
/div>