WASHINGTON — President Bush pitched his Social Security restructuring plan to Latinos on Wednesday, saying his approach would extend the benefits of ownership to low-wage workers who otherwise might not save for retirement.
Bush told Latino business owners that the restructured retirement system he had in mind would maintain currently promised benefits for lower-paid workers, but give them the opportunity to channel part of their payroll taxes into investment accounts that they could control and pass on to their heirs.
"That's the great promise of America," Bush said. "That's what we're all about. You come here, you work hard, you realize your dreams, and you have a chance to build something for your family."
Bush's remarks to the Latino Small Business Economic Conference were part of a White House effort to tailor the president's Social Security campaign to specific ethnic, demographic and political constituencies.
But representatives of several organizations opposed to Bush's plan said that the more Latinos learned about the investment risks and benefit changes that would accompany personal accounts, the less they liked what they saw.
"Now that the president is beginning to disclose details, we are beginning to see some of the devils in them," said Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles), who heads the Congressional Hispanic Caucus task force on Social Security.
Bush has made Social Security restructuring the top domestic policy priority of his second term. For months he has been trying to generate public support for taking steps this year to close the retirement system's long-term financial shortfall, and to let workers born in 1950 and after divert up to a third of their payroll taxes into individual investment accounts.
Polls suggest that his campaign has not generated a strong public mandate for his approach to restructuring, or punctured a solid wall of Democratic opposition in Congress. Bush may have made the task even more difficult last week by expressing interest in a formula that would preserve currently promised benefits for low-wage workers but reduce future payouts to middle-income and higher-paid retirees.
In a background briefing with reporters Wednesday, senior administration officials took issue with the way the plan had been characterized by opponents. They said it was a "false choice" to compare benefits payable under the new formula with those scheduled under the current system, because payroll tax collections would be insufficient to support them over the long run.
