I’ll just take cash, please.
The recession has eaten into people’s nest eggs so the government is promoting ways to make it easier to save for retirement.
One initiative that President Barack Obama outlined in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday will allow people to have their federal tax refunds sent as savings bonds.
Take a California-style IOU over a check I can deposit? Who would be stupid enough to do that in light of what they’ve done to the debt in the past year?
I can’t stop thinking about how little time it would take for him to make taking the Bonds madatory after implementing this idea. Of course, first they’d try making it an “Opt Out” system (like they do here now in WA for state park fees) and then hide the option in a little box in an unsed corner.
AND make the opt out “option” permanent, so if you missed the opt out selection to get a check in 2010, you are SOL forever after.
What do you want to bet that your refund will equal the savings bond face amount, not the purchase price?
This is negotiating like Communists. Give me something tangible and valuable now, I’ll give you a promise of something later, but we’ll renegotiate before I have to actually deliver.
I have a better idea.
How about having our social security taxes returned to us in the form of Chinese or Russian government bonds?
I bet my neighbor would be dumb enough to do this.
Good grief.
The solution to unfunded future liabilities is to…create more future liabilities?
One wonders where any of these people received their Economics or Finance degrees.
At some point “Full Faith and Credit of the US Government” will cease to be meaningful…if it isn’t already so.
Then there’s this gem:
“More than 100 million U.S. households receive refund checks each year, and many are promptly cashed and spent.”
Hello? Bueller? Wasn’t that *last year’s* strategy, with the $600/$1200 “stimulus checks”? If it was good last year, why is it bad now?
Asshats.
I’d take my tax refund in US Govt surplus 308/223 ammo. I promise I’ll save it.