Stacy Innerst, Post-Gazette Click illustration for larger image.

Sen. Pat Moynihan, D-N.Y., liked to call it "thievery." Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., called it deceit. My old boss, Pennsylvania Sen. John Heinz called it "embezzlement." To which felonious act was this bipartisan cast of senior senators referring? To Congress raiding the Social Security Trust Fund -- meant to fund our retirements decades from now -- so that it could hide trillions of dollars in government spending.

It's an insupportable practice, and in this congressional session, Pennsylvania's delegation should take up where the late Sen. Heinz left off, leading a bipartisan drive to break the habit and fix the Social Security system.

Unfortunately, in his State of the Union address Tuesday night, President Bush chose to dodge the issue, advising members of Congress that it was "our duty" to "fix Medicare and Medicaid and save Social Security" while offering not a single idea of his own.

When it comes to keeping our commitments to seniors and taxpayers, members of Congress need to ask themselves: Can 2007 be the year the pilferage finally stops? Do we have the will to stop looking for quick fixes like personal retirement accounts and make the real changes Social Security needs? Shouldn't the system be fairer to women? And, finally, if we can't do these things, shouldn't we just repeal that portion of our Social Security taxes that are being pilfered -- and give the money back to the American people?

Jeffrey R. Lewis, president of the Heinz Family Philanthropies, was staff director for the late U.S. Sen. John Heinz, R-Pa. (jlewis@heinzoffice.org).

With the private pension system in full retreat and middle-class wages stagnant, the idea of a three-layered retirement system -- combining personal savings, pensions and Social Security -- has become a mirage for too many Americans. In 2004, fully 20 percent of seniors received "all" of their income from Social Security; a third received 90 percent or more from Social Security, and nearly two thirds received 50 percent or more from Social Security. Women are even more reliant on America's only true safety net: A third of nonmarried, aged women rely on Social Security for all of their income, and nearly 50 percent rely on it for half their income.

Yet, since 1983, Congress has run off with more than $2 trillion of Social Security taxes, most recently using the money to cover large income tax cuts for the wealthy, to fund two wars to the tune of $100 billion a year, to subsidize oil companies and agribusinesses and to underwrite billions in congressional earmarks for pet projects.

Social Security needs new revenue; it needs benefit restraint for the future, and it desperately needs benefit improvements for women. That means tackling, not avoiding the long-range deficits of the Social Security program.

Unfortunately, personal saving account plans, like that which Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has promised to introduce this year, amount to little more than an end-run around real Social Security reform. Rather than strengthening the existing system, which has proven effective for tens of millions of retirees for more than 70 years, Sen. Sessions would use tax dollars to create a whole new system that is little more than window dressing for the same failed policy the White House proposed two years ago.

Under Sen. Sessions' plan, every baby born would have a retirement account opened in his or her name at birth -- complete with a $1,000 first deposit. As the child grew up, parents and grandparents could contribute to the accounts, which would be invested in one of a series of pre-approved plans and remain untouchable until retirement age. Once they entered the work force, employees would contribute -- and employers would match -- at least 1 percent of their salaries.

It sounds reasonable, at first. But, just as there's no free lunch, there's no free retirement. Certain to cost tens of billions of dollars initially, the Sessions plan could easily run into hundreds of billions of dollars over the next few decades. Yet, Sen. Sessions has offered no funding plan, no recognition of our other commitments and no acknowledgement of the budget shortfalls the existing system faces.

But the plan does raise a curious question: If we can find common ground to raise payroll withholding taxes to fund new personal accounts, why can't we do so to shore up Social Security? Surely we should fix one system before we create another.

Sen. Sessions also avoids the difficult challenge of making Social Security more fair and equitable to women. Aged women on Social Security outnumber male counterparts by a third, and by age 90, they outnumber them three to one. Nearly 20 percent of all nonmarried aged are poor, and four out of five are women

How exactly would personal savings accounts improve their lot? During their working years, women earn less, they are more likely than men to work part time, and they take more breaks in service to raise families. A system based on earnings and earnings-based employer contributions will only widen the gap between men's and women's relative affluence in retirement.

Social Security works. It will work even better if we face up now to the system's modest but critical long-term challenges in funding and its treatment of women.

If we can't do that, if the best we can do is create another stream of red ink for yet another government program, while spending the trust fund as if there's no tomorrow, then let's just give people something more meaningful -- a real tax cut. Let them have their money back.