Reports over the last couple years have suggested that the U.S. government would move to seize traditional 401k and IRA retirement accounts by rolling them into a government managed Guaranteed Retirement Account, or GRA. For the most part, save in alternative media circles, the reports have been dismissed as nothing more than an “idea” floating around.

But the bill has reportedly already been written and last Thursday, October 7, 2010, Congress held a recess hearing on the matter. The push to bailout union pensions and give more control of  individual wealth to the U.S. government is underway.

Democrats in the Senate on Thursday held a recess hearing covering a taxpayer bailout of union pensions and a plan to seize private 401(k) plans to more “fairly” distribute taxpayer-funded pensions to everyone.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee heard from hand-picked witnesses advocating the infamous “Guaranteed Retirement Account” (GRA) authored by Theresa Guilarducci.

(You can find the blistering interview with Guilarducci by radio talk show host Mark Levin in 2007 at the link).

In a nutshell, under the GRA system government would seize private 401(k) accounts, setting up an additional 5% mandatory payroll tax to dole out a “fair” pension to everyone using that confiscated money coupled with the mandated contributions.  This would, of course, be a sister government ponzi scheme working in tandem with Social Security, the primary purpose being to give big government politicians additional taxpayer funds to raid to pay for their out-of-control spending.

source: Human Events

The government is moving to control every aspect of our lives, and those who deny this should take a quick look at what they did with Fannie, Freddie, GM, Chrysler, Citibank and who knows what else.

Now, they are going to take over your 401k. Perhaps you have tens of thousands sitting pretty for retirement – now the government will get to decide what happens to it, because it’s just not “fair” that you have a larger retirement than the next guy.

Our guess: They’ll use YOUR money to fund the national debt through the purchase of low yield US treasuries, and as the US dollar gets completely destroyed, the interest produced by your bonds will not be enough to offset the depreciation. As Karl Denninger points out, if a law like this passes it’s likely to be snuck into the next mega-bailout bank bill (when they start collapsing due to the foreclosure mess), and like before, there will be nothing the American people can do to stop it.

Though the elections in November are expected to shift the power in Congress, if democrats enact this bill before the new Congress takes over in January, we find it difficult to believe that any such law will be repealed.We hold a similar sentiment in regards to the health care bill, which we believe will not be repealed so long as a democrat President sits in the Oval Office. Whether that would change if a republican President were in charge, along with a republican Congress, is only speculation at this point.