There is no way a significant number of House members will vote to cut Social Security benefits 12 months before the next election, and their leaders would be foolish to ask them to do so. Republican leaders did something similar in 1985, and it cost the Republicans control of the Senate the next year. Therefore, the only hope of starting personal retirement accounts this year is to pass a clean GROW Accounts bill, unadorned by any other so-called "solvency measures."
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, with the concurrence of Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, has committed to bringing a clean GROW Accounts bill directly to the Senate floor without first sending it through the Finance Committee, from which nothing good can possibly emerge. If the House sends the Senate a complicated bill with provisions other than the GROW Accounts, the majority leader may find it impossible to avoid referring the bill to the Finance Committee.
If a clean GROW Accounts bill is brought straight to the Senate floor, it may well be filibustered. So be it. Senators would be forced to go on the record unambiguously in favor of or opposed to personal retirement accounts. If it proves impossible to find the 60 votes required to shut off debate and bring GROW Accounts to a vote in the Senate, then the issue can be taken to the people in next year's election.
Ownership is the key to democratizing our capitalist system. When every worker becomes an owner, every family will gain access to equity and capital, which are the keys to success. The GROW Accounts bill not only makes a down payment on Social Security solvency, it also opens the door to an ownership society.