Investing in the ObamaFund; Treasury rolls out a new savings plan without a Congressional vote.

wsj.com ^ | 12/29/14

[Liz]

EXCERPT—--the WH wants you to consider a retirement plan that will invest in nothing but US government debt. Any financial professional who advised this—would be sued for malpractice. But asset allocation is merely one of the problems with the new “myRA” fund rolling out this month.

A form of Roth IRA that allows people to save after-tax dollars and watch them grow tax-free until retirement, the new myRA offers a single investment option. It’s a private version of the G Fund that is available to federal workers and has lately been delivering annual returns of about 2% on its portfolio of Treasury securities.

Readers will recall Obama’s announcement in January’s SOTU address.....said he would direct the Treasury to create this new retirement plan, which was puzzling because such plans are normally created by law, not Presidential order. Treasury is now offering the accounts and has hired Texas-based Comerica to manage them with a partner -----Fidelity National Information Services. But the executive branch received no new authority from Congress to launch the program.

Treasury is funding the program out of its "Bureau of the Fiscal Service" budget...... an assertion that existing law allows this part of the Treasury to hire financial agents as part of its mission to efficiently finance the federal government.

The subsidies are likely to be small at first, but the history of government programs is that they expand over time......if such a subsidy scheme can be enacted administratively, does anyone think this will be the last time such power is exercised? New investors should be encouraged to consider ways to build wealth beyond simply lending money to the feds. And if politicians want taxpayers to support another retirement program, they should do so through law, not White House whim.

[Liz]

MyRA sounds like the Obamacare MO-——I hear Obama has Jonathan Gruber on speed dial.

THE GRUBER MODEL First, the helpful do-good govt establishes the high-sounding program. Then they’ll make it mandatory and require all pension funds to be invested in it.

You end up w/ a retirement plan that will confiscate your lifelong savings to invest in nothing but the $17 trillion debt Obama’s Marxist government has run up w/ its cockamamie Commie ideas.

Jonathan Gruber is setting-up the consultant jobs as we type.

[silverleaf]

the gibsmedats are not going to appreciate having to save this taxpayer provided loot for retirement

[Liz]

BARF BAG, ANYONE?

Obama says Treasury is funding the MyRA program out of its "Bureau of the Fiscal Service" budget....an assertion that existing law allows this part of the Treasury to hire financial agents as part of its mission to efficiently finance the federal government.

The Bureau of the Fiscal Service is a new Bureau of the Treasury Department formed from the consolidation of the Financial Management Service and the Bureau of the Public Debt.

Our mission is to promote the financial integrity and operational efficiency of the U.S. government through exceptional accounting, financing, collections, payments, and shared services.

Our vision is to help transform financial management and delivery of shared services in the federal government. We'll provide exceptional services and collaborate with and help other government organizations raise the level of their performance.

We'll meet our goals by introducing a level of efficiency, transparency and accountability that positively affects the public perception of how government works.

The Bureau of the Fiscal Service will be a valued partner for agencies as they work to strengthen their own financial management or as they look for a quality service provider who can allow them to focus on their missions.

WEB SITE http://www.fiscal.treasury.gov/

Other US Treasury Bureaus--linked

<><>The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau

<><> Bureau of Engraving & Printing

<><>Community Development Financial Institutions Fund

<><>Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCen)

<><>Internal Revenue Service

<><>Office of The Comptroller of the Currency

<><>U.S. Mint

[Liz]

Anything emanating out of the US Treasury has to be examined against the backdrop of Chicago criminal kingpin Obama and his henchmen----and their sub rosa activities at the US Treasury. When the Chicago criminal combine landed in Washington they did two things that were apparently intrinsic to their evil plans:

<><> They took over the US Census.

<><> Obama's COS was placed in an unusual dual role: (1) in the WH, and, (2) in the US Treasury.

THE SMOKING GUN---WSJ REPORT--On Jan 20, 2009 Timothy Geithner was appointed Obama's Secy of the Treasury. But within three weeks, the Obama White House tightened its grip on Treasury. Obama put his COS, Rahm Emanuel, in charge of Treasury---Rahm Emanuel's dual role was an unusual move.

When he got to Treasury, WH COS Rahm Emanuel was so intimately involved in the inner workings of the Treasury, that the phrase "Rahm wants it" had become an unofficial mantra among subservient govt staffers, prostrate in obeisance, scurrying to accede to Rahm's wishes, according to Treasury government officials. Reported by WSJ / 05/31/09

More here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124113406528875137.html

=========================================================

STROLL DOWN MEMORY LANE Rahm is nothing but a poor street urchin who w/ just 10 cents in his pocket, "accidentally" got into big-time Chicago politics ---miraculously Rahm then became a multi-millionaire overnight. The Chicago mayoralty (and its--cough--"benefits") is a job poor Emanuel has coveted since he was a penniless machine go-fer back in the 1980s.....before he became Bill Clinton's national campaign finance chairman and served a dual role as senior White House aide AND Goldman Sachs lobbyist.

After Rahm "accidentally" became a multi-millionaire, thanks to a measly few months at a Wall Street investment firm......he decided to run for Congressman (was there for four terms). Hard-scrabble Rahm's accidental stumble into politics culminated in Rahm picked as Obama's White House chief of staff .... and a dual role as Obama's hand-picked man at Treasury with an unarticulated "job description."

Later, Rahm held a presser declaring he "just remembered" he really, Really wanted to be Mayor of Chicago. Then Rahm announced he had "accidentally" raised $10 million for his campaign "in just a matter of weeks." Seems the poverty-stricken bugger had "accidentally wired" federal tax dollars offshore at the time he was in a dual role as Obama's COS AND in charge of the entire US Treasury.

Sob.

[TheCipher]

THE GRUBER MODEL First, the helpful do-good govt establishes the high-sounding program. Then they’ll make it mandatory and require all pension funds to be invested in it.

Yep, the first step in seizing retirement accounts. Two years ago, the U.S. Department of Labor and the Treasury Department held joint hearings on whether government lifetime annuity options funded by U.S. Treasury debt should be required for private retirement accounts, including IRAs and 401(k) plans.

From that hearing:

A representative of the liberal Pension Rights Center, Rebecca Davis, testified that the government needs to get involved because 401k plans and IRAs are unfair to poor people. She demanded the Obama administration set up a “government-sponsored program administered by the PBGC (the governments’ Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation).” She proclaimed that even “private annuities are problematic.”

Such “reforms” would effectively end private retirement accounts in America, Crone warns. “These people want the government to require that ultimately all Americans buy these government annuities instead of saving or investing on their own. The Government could then take these trillions of dollars and redistribute it through this new national retirement system.”

[Liz]

Thanks for the valuable input.

[rockvillem]

You nailed it.

And there are real-world examples of exactly this sort of nationalization: Argentina, Poland, Portugal, Hungary, etc.

The trillions invested in private retirement accounts are an irresistible temptation to the Marxists. It’s the biggest pot of “other people’s money” out there.

[grania]

Social Security as originally conceived was a retirement fund that would provide a modest pension to retirees, keeping them from descending into poverty. Surpise!! It covers lots of other stuff that ruins its financial integrity and the money's all been spent.

Why would this be any different? What is there to stop the next step being that all 401 plans have to be through this agency?

[DJ Frisat]

"...the WH wants you to consider a retirement plan that will invest in nothing but US government debt."

Ah, yes. The beginning.

The next step is:

"...the WH WANTS you to consider a retirement plan that will invest in nothing but US government debt.

And after that:

"Anyone not enrolling in this voluntary retirement plan that will invest in nothing but US government debt will be subject to a fine (which may later be considered a tax in order to sneak past a weak, compliant Supreme Court). Members of Congress will exempt and will continue with their current retirement program and benefits."

And, after the confiscation of our $ begins, we'll be treated to tortuous explanations of how popular and successful the program is in reducing government debt.

Except that it won't. It's just new $ to give away to people who neither earned nor deserve it.

Orwell would be proud.

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[Nervous Tick]

>> the WH wants you to consider a retirement plan that will invest in nothing but US government debt

Okay. [...considering...considering...considering...]

NO. Hail no. Go play golf or something. Leave me alone.

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[KC_Lion]

A: WTF is "Bureau of Fiscal Service"? MORE Bureaucracy?

B. Ubama doesn't need congressional oversight, he IS People's Ulimate Representative and doesn't need the Representatives the People Voted it.

[PGalt]

Thanks for posting, Liz. Totalitarian paving the way for government/bank bail-in. U$$C - Roberts in the United Socialist Supreme Court can rubber stamp…tweak the particulars. Why touch it CONgre$$?

[moovova]

All your pension plans are belong to us.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Once again, there needs to be some variety of “personal liberty amendment”, by which individual citizens can choose to “decouple” themselves from any direct involvement with the national government.

It would cover the gamut: an opt-out of Social Security and Medicare, their federal taxes would be directly paid to their state which would then remit the appropriate amount to the IRS or equivalent, the military draft, if applicable, would also be through their state. Except for criminal records, the federal government would only be allowed an “actual enumeration”, that they exist for electoral reasons, and nothing more. No other federal dossier or database records of them would be allowed.

Likewise, unless they wanted to travel outside the US, there would be no need for identification beyond a *state* driver’s license to travel interstate.

While citizens would still be “Americans”, their affiliation should be to their home state.