corrente

Hey! I just took care of my retirement. Yes, I went out and bought some lottery tickets! And best of all, it really isn't going to cost me anything. I pawned my laptop to get the money for the tickets, and when I win, I'll go get it back!

Sounds loony, doesn't it? Well, that's about what Bush's plan to privatize Social Security boils down to. See Krugman's essential "Borrow, Speculate, and Hope", where Krugman writes:

There is, by the way, a precedent for Bush-style privatization. One major reason for Argentina's rapid debt buildup in the 1990s was a pension reform involving a switch to individual accounts — a switch that President Carlos Menem, like Bush, decided to finance with borrowing rather than taxes. So Bush intends to emulate a plan that helped set the stage for Argentina's economic crisis.

So what's Krugman whining about, anyhow? Argentina escaped their creditors by defaulting; we'll screw China and Japan by defaulting. What's the big deal here? If they were stupid enough to buy our bonds, they deserve whatever happens to them, right?