The Countdown to the Nationalization of Retirement Savings Has Begun

The Countdown to the Nationalization of Retirement Savings Has Begun

http://www.internationalman.com/78-global-perspectives/1083-countdown-to-the-nationalization-of-retirement-savings#

By Nick Giambruno

Simply put, the new myRA program put forward by Obama is at best a sucker's deal… or worse, it's a first step toward the nationalization of private retirement savings. (Note: If you haven't yet heard of myRA, I'd strongly suggest you read this excellent overview by my colleague Dan Steinhart.)

Even before the new myRA program was announced, there had been whispers about the need for the US government to assume some risk for US retirement accounts. That's code for forced conversion of private retirement assets into government bonds.

With foreigners not buying as many Treasuries and the Fed tapering, the US government has been searching for new buyers of its unwanted debt. And this is where the new myRA program comes in.

In short, it's ostensibly a new way for people to save for retirement. Of course, you can only invest in government-approved investments—like Treasuries—which probably won't even come close to keeping up with the real rate of inflation. It's like Jim Grant says: "return-free risk."

In reality, a myRA doesn't really provide any significant new benefits over existing options. To me it just looks like a way for the US government to pass the hot potato on to unsuspecting Americans in exchange for their retirement savings.

The net effect is the funneling of more capital to Treasury securities and thus helping the US government finance itself.

You'd be much better off using a precious metals IRA to save for retirement than participating in the government's latest Ponzi scheme.

There are other protective strategies as well, such as internationalizing your retirement savings into assets that are hard, if not impossible, to confiscate on a whim—like foreign real estate and physical gold held abroad. More on that below.

Retirement Savings Are Always Juicy Targets

As bad as it is to deceive naïve Americans into trading their hard-earned retirement savings for garbage (i.e., Treasury securities), the myRA program potentially represents something far worse… the first step toward the nationalization of existing private retirement accounts.

I believe myRA is a way to nudge the American people into gradually becoming more accustomed to government involvement in their private retirement savings.

It's incorrect to assume nationalization couldn't happen in the US or your home country. History shows us that it's standard operating procedure for a government in dire financial straits.

In just the past six years, it's happened in some form in Argentina, Poland, Portugal, Hungary, and numerous other countries.

To me it's self-evident that most Western governments (including the US) have current debt loads and future spending commitments that all but guarantee that eventually—and likely someday soon—they will try to unscrupulously grab as much wealth as they can.

And retirement savings are a juicy target—low-hanging fruit for a desperate government.

Naturally, politicians will try to slickly sell the idea to the public as something "for their own good" or as "protection from market instability." This is how similar programs were sold to skeptical publics in the past.

In reality, governments take these actions not to "reduce the risk" to your retirement savings or whatever propaganda they happen to come up with, but rather to obtain financing—by forcefully dumping their unwanted debt onto seniors and savers.

Below are several ways it has happened or could happen. Of course, there could always be some sort of new, creative proposal that was previously unthinkable. No matter the method, however, the end result is always the same—the siphoning off of purchasing power from your retirement savings.

New Contribution Mandate: The government could mandate, for example, that 50% of new contributions to private retirement accounts must consist of "safe," government-approved investments, like Treasury securities.

Forced Conversions: This is where a government will forcibly convert existing assets held in retirement accounts into so-called "safer" assets, such as government bonds. For example, if the US government forcibly converted 20% of the estimated $20 trillion in retirement assets (401k plans, IRAs, defined benefit and contribution plans, etc.), it would net them $4 trillion. Not a bad score, considering the national debt is north of $17 trillion.

Special Taxes: The government could look into levying special taxes on distributions from retirement, especially those deemed to be "excessively large."

In order to be more effective, forced conversations probably wouldn't happen until after official capital controls have been instituted. Once in place, capital controls would make it very difficult, if not impossible, for you to avoid the wealth confiscation that is sure to follow… like a sheep that has just been penned in for a shearing.

Since FATCA and other regulatory burdens already amount to a soft form of capital controls, it's absolutely essential that you start implementing protective measures now.

It's like I have always said: internationalization is your ultimate insurance against the measures of a desperate government. In the case that the government makes a grab for retirement savings, it's much better to be a year or two early rather than a minute too late.

Isn't it amazing? It seems they just sit there and think up new ways to steal our money.

That's right! Invest your money with Wall Street! They'll take care of it for you! (see Bernie Madoff)  

Glad you brought up Bernie.

In Obama latest scheme, the government will skim a percentage of the worker’s income from their paycheck. In exchange, the government will issue an IOU, which of course won't pay out until the worker retires. Working-class Americans would effectively be giving the government a long-term loan at a well below market ROI.

The Dems will praise this as good for the middle class.

Now will that money be invested and saved, or just dumped into the general fund? We all know when it comes due, there will be no money and the taxpayer will be on the hook…again.

US retirement accounts hold well over $5 trillion in assets. The US government owes a mind-boggling $17+ trillion in debt. You can almost hear Uncle Sam salivate. The MyRA MAY be the first baby step toward acclimating people to the idea that retirement savings are too important to entrust 100% to the market. Government bonds, you see, are much safer.

It appears they have already assimilated you News Buzzard.

But for the rest of us…If Obama thinks it's a good idea, you don't want anything to do with it. Have your money managed by the same entity that contracted and managed the Obamacare website build. I couldn’t be more underwhelmed by that idea.

Somehow the leftists in the federal government have managed to increase their hold on student loans, housing, and health insurance. Why not retirement? Not hard to see these accounts becoming mandatory. But what about those living paycheck to paycheck??? Well they will need to have their contributions…subsidized of course.

The Feds will gladly pay you in 30 years if they can loot you today.

Yes, how long will it be before they take SS away from people who have paid in all their lives?

Anti Federalist wrote:
By Nick Giambruno


You'd be much better off using a precious metals IRA to save for retirement than participating in the government's latest Ponzi scheme.

There are other protective strategies as well, such as internationalizing your retirement savings into assets that are hard, if not impossible, to confiscate on a whim—like foreign real estate and physical gold held abroad. More on that below.

Nick Giambruno just had to promote what he does for a living.  He wants us to  internationalize our money or buy precious metal.
Stop investing in America and go off shore.  NICE!!

This is something that Anti must be proud of to post.

Here is what International Man offers:

1. Savings: This area covers how to setup offshore bank/brokerage/financial accounts, foreign real estate and "bolt-holes" in case of trouble, moving and owning gold overseas, and structures like foreign trusts that help to legally reduce taxes.

2. Yourself: Obtaining a second passport from another country and establishing legal residency in foreign countries.

3. Income: The structuring of your cash flows to reduce dependency on any one source in any one jurisdiction. Establishing additional sources of revenue, international investment opportunities and trends, setting up an offshore company.

4. Digital Presence: This commonly includes your IP address (which can often pinpoint you to a precise physical address), email account, online file storage, and the components of personal/business websites.[/b]

WHL wrote:Yes, how long will it be before they take SS away from people who have paid in all their lives?

That's so true! There's been a radical change since the Tea Party tried to take Social Security and Medicare away from us, and now that New Hampshire is going for the expansion of Medicaid it looks like Obamacare is here to stay! Life is good!

When the old USSR dried up and blew away, millions that were depending on the system were cut off, overnight.

Many of those people died.

Since progs and establishment RINOs have now insisted that we follow the same course of action that led to their demise, I am highly supportive of people keeping an eye on the exits and being ready to bail out before the authoritarian types in this thread for instance, insist that people be forced to stay, for the common good.

I'd be giving the same advice to people in Germany and Austria, circa 1936 or so.

Achigan wrote:

Anti Federalist wrote:
By Nick Giambruno


You'd be much better off using a precious metals IRA to save for retirement than participating in the government's latest Ponzi scheme.

There are other protective strategies as well, such as internationalizing your retirement savings into assets that are hard, if not impossible, to confiscate on a whim—like foreign real estate and physical gold held abroad. More on that below.

Nick Giambruno just had to promote what he does for a living.  He wants us to  internationalize our money or buy precious metal.
Stop investing in America and go off shore.  NICE!!

This is something that Anti must be proud of to post.

Here is what International Man offers:

1. Savings: This area covers how to setup offshore bank/brokerage/financial accounts, foreign real estate and "bolt-holes" in case of trouble, moving and owning gold overseas, and structures like foreign trusts that help to legally reduce taxes.

2. Yourself: Obtaining a second passport from another country and establishing legal residency in foreign countries.

3. Income: The structuring of your cash flows to reduce dependency on any one source in any one jurisdiction. Establishing additional sources of revenue, international investment opportunities and trends, setting up an offshore company.

4. Digital Presence: This commonly includes your IP address (which can often pinpoint you to a precise physical address), email account, online file storage, and the components of personal/business websites.[/b]

WHL wrote:Yes, how long will it be before they take SS away from people who have paid in all their lives?

That's already long gone.

All that's left is an IOU and a gun held to the head of current workers to pay the bill.

But that is coming to the end that all Ponzi schemes must: default and collapse.

Numbers don't lie.

Anti Federalist saves himself, his family, and a remnant of all the world's animals from the flood. God gives Anti Federalist detailed instructions for building the ark: it is to be of gopher wood, smeared inside and out with pitch, with three decks and internal compartments; it will be 300 cubits long (137.16 m, 450 ft), 50 wide (22.86 m, 75 ft), and 30 high (13.716 m, 45 ft); it will have a roof "finished to a cubit upward", and an entrance on the side.

Anti Federalist is to bring a pair of every kind of animal—a male and a female—into the boat with you to keep them alive during the flood. Pairs of every kind of bird, and every kind of animal, and every kind of small animal that scurries along the ground, will come to you to be kept alive. And be sure to take on board enough food for your family and for all the animals. So Anti Federalist did everything exactly as God had commanded him.

And he lived happily ever after in his new world.

Achigan wrote:Anti Federalist saves himself, his family, and a remnant of all the world's animals from the flood. God gives Anti Federalist detailed instructions for building the ark: it is to be of gopher wood, smeared inside and out with pitch, with three decks and internal compartments; it will be 300 cubits long (137.16 m, 450 ft), 50 wide (22.86 m, 75 ft), and 30 high (13.716 m, 45 ft); it will have a roof "finished to a cubit upward", and an entrance on the side.

Anti Federalist is to bring a pair of every kind of animal—a male and a female—into the boat with you to keep them alive during the flood. Pairs of every kind of bird, and every kind of animal, and every kind of small animal that scurries along the ground, will come to you to be kept alive. And be sure to take on board enough food for your family and for all the animals. So Anti Federalist did everything exactly as God had commanded him.

And he lived happily ever after in his new world.

Even Stink Beetles.

Well, I'm going with Anti if all that is left are the progs.

WHL wrote:Well, I'm going with Anti if all that is left are the progs.

You can be in the cage with the stink beetles.

Much rather be with them than you progs.

LOL - Missed that whole exchange.