"The Roosevelt enactment of Social Security was a moral revolution in our country: We were assured that we would never reach the very depths of poverty. And to be told, that we are now going to gamble it, on Wall Street, is nonsense!"
About this Quote
That’s why his disgust at "gamble it, on Wall Street" lands with such force. The verb is theological as much as economic: gambling implies temptation, moral recklessness, a surrender to idols - in this case, the market’s glamour and the fantasy that risk is always virtuous if it’s profitable. He’s also smuggling in a critique of power: Wall Street isn’t just a place, it’s a symbol of an elite game whose losses get socialized only when the players are rich.
The context is the late-20th/early-2000s push to privatize Social Security, sold as modernization and "ownership". Hertzberg hears something darker: a pivot from solidarity to individualized exposure. "Nonsense!" is more than outrage; it’s a refusal to let technocratic language sanitize what he sees as an ethical breach. Social Security, in his telling, is not an investment product. It’s the floor beneath a society that wants to call itself decent.
Quote Details
| Topic | Investment |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Hertzberg, Arthur. (2026, January 17). The Roosevelt enactment of Social Security was a moral revolution in our country: We were assured that we would never reach the very depths of poverty. And to be told, that we are now going to gamble it, on Wall Street, is nonsense! FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-roosevelt-enactment-of-social-security-was-a-41234/
Chicago Style
Hertzberg, Arthur. "The Roosevelt enactment of Social Security was a moral revolution in our country: We were assured that we would never reach the very depths of poverty. And to be told, that we are now going to gamble it, on Wall Street, is nonsense!" FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-roosevelt-enactment-of-social-security-was-a-41234/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The Roosevelt enactment of Social Security was a moral revolution in our country: We were assured that we would never reach the very depths of poverty. And to be told, that we are now going to gamble it, on Wall Street, is nonsense!" FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-roosevelt-enactment-of-social-security-was-a-41234/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.
