The Democrats have their shorts in a knot about privatizing Social Security for one reason: loss of power.

Moving the retirement system out of government control means losing that nice hammerlock around the necks of the most reliable voting group in America. If the left actually gave a rat's ass about whether or not the elderly had a decent retirement system, the arguments in favor of privatization would impress them, and they don't:

1. Lack of growth performance of Social Security compared to almost any other investment over the long term (getting a nice retirement nest egg IS what Social Security is all about, right?) Social Security is only slightly better than putting your money in a sock. The stock market has a positive long-term performance, even over the Depression years.

2. With private investment, the investment is part of your estate, and can be left to your kids. With Social Security, if you croak at 66, Uncle Sammy walks off with your life's work. Heck, in this light, putting your money in a sock is actually better.

3. Social Security is a financial shell game that would have a private industry thrown into jail. The money goes into the system, and is immediately used to buy Treasury bills. That is, the government "loans" the money to itself. Then the freed up cash goes out to wherever it is used. Some to pay current retirees, some to go into the usual rat holes. The "trust fund" is a load of IOUs, which will theoretically be paid back, with interest, from future tax revenues. At no point in this process is wealth actually created. Paying "investors" off with the money from other "investors" and never actually doing anything productive with the cash is called a Ponzi scheme, and for us mortals, it's a crime.

In a private investment, the money goes to production and the creation of actual wealth. There is more money at the end of the process than there was at the beginning. Everyone gains.

Note that all privatization plans I have seen so far offer people early in the game the option of going with either partial privatization or staying with the system. Seems okay to me. Stay with the Ponzi scheme if it makes you feel better.*

It is interesting to note some of the other areas where the left fights tooth and nail against reforms: all of them in their current state provide the government with vast power over its citizens, and all of them if reformed would cause a loss of that power. These include public education, and the tax system.

*Now, if you really want to, go ahead and make the standard argument at this point: "But if people are given the option to leave Social Security, they will do so in droves, and the system will go broke!" (a similar argument is often heard about school vouchers). If your real concern is for the people, and not the system, you might want to think about it first. A retirement program that needs to be enforced at gunpoint may not have a lot going for it.