This article, originally published in Dollars & Sense: Real World Economics , is being reprinted in New Solutions to bring attention to efforts to privatize, dismantle, and fail to protect and expand the U.S. Social Security system. Social Security is an essential element for protecting the health, safety, and well-being of retired U.S. workers and their family members. This article explains attempts to weaken the system and efforts that can be made to sustain the system. The author asks and responds to the question, “Why then would anyone swap a highly successful Social Security system that provides life insurance as well as disability and retirement benefits for private retirement accounts?”