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  • From: bob ford <bobford79 AT yahoo.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Homestead] Left-wing gov't helping retirement plans
  • Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2008 16:09:22 -0800 (PST)

Argentina's progressive leftist gov't is going to (take), 'nationalize'
every citizens private retirement funds so as to help 'save' the citizens
amid this funancial crisis (this is the kind of superior thinking that
advanced degrees get you). They are also sending out gov't goons to
uintimidate people who are trading for better currencies as stores of wealth.



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NOVEMBER 7, 2008

In Argentina, Pension Law Advances

By MATT MOFFETT

»BUENOS AIRES -- Argentina's leftist government presented its controversial
proposal to nationalize private pension funds to the lower house of Congress,
which was expected to approve it late Thursday or early Friday.

President Cristina Kirchner said that seizing the private funds -- which have
nearly $30 billion in assets, as well as future pension contributions
amounting to $4 to $5 billion annually -- will protect Argentina's savers
amid the global market turbulence. But economists say the takeover is
intended to get the Kirchner government out of a cash squeeze in the coming
year, during which it will face heavy debt payments as well as political
pressure to increase spending as midterm elections approach.

Mrs. Kirchner's Peronist party boasts a strong majority in the lower house.
In recent days, the government has negotiated more than a dozen small changes
to the bill with congressional leaders. Analysts say the Kirchner
administration learned a lesson from a crushing Senate defeat it suffered in
July when it tried ramming through an increase in the soybean-export tax with
little prior consultation.

Opposition to the pension measure was vocal, though not nearly as broad-based
as the opposition to the soybean tax. "The government says it has its
accounts in order, but it is launching a fiscal grab," opposition Congressman
Fernando Iglesias said in remarks during the debate on Thursday.

If approved in the lower house, the measure would move on to the Senate,
where the government's majority is slimmer. The association representing the
10 private funds, which were created in 1994 under a conservative Argentine
administration, has also threatened legal challenges to the takeover.

In the meantime, the government has been employing strong-arm tactics to
bolster the embattled peso and stem a surge in dollar-buying by Argentine
investors unnerved by the nationalization bid. Made wary by their country's
history of repeated economic crises, many Argentines fear the pension
takeover portends even greater state intervention in the economy.

Since the government announced the nationalization on Oct. 21, the central
bank has had to spend about $1 billion in reserves to defend the peso.

This week, government tax auditors have descended on currency-exchange
houses, which under new government requirements have begun to require more
information on the sources of income of those seeking to obtain dollars. The
government has said it is aiming to halt tax evasion, but exchange traders
say the move is actually aimed at intimidating those seeking dollars and
those selling them. In another move to stem market volatility and put a lid
on the dollar outflow, the government issued rules earlier this week
requiring banks to hold bonds in their portfolios for at least three days
before selling them.

Some of the new exchange measures are being administered by Argentina's
internal commerce secretary, Guillermo Moreno, who has become a lightning rod
for criticism in recent years because of his efforts to damp inflation
through price controls and threats of prosecution for price gouging or
hoarding.

Most financial institutions in Argentina were closed for a holiday on
Thursday.







  • [Homestead] Left-wing gov't helping retirement plans, bob ford, 11/06/2008

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