hey, remember when...

401(k) mutual funds crashed in 2000?

I sure do. I'd just been laid off from my one and only "safe" corporate job, just gotten divorced, just...well, just had my life fall apart. Then everything I had left from 17 years of marriage disappeared overnight.

wellll...mutual funds have recovered since then, it seems. Enough that Unca Sugar wants to pull the money out and replace it with IOUs.

Of course, that's not the spin. Instead of a lump-sum payment of your own money, you'd get government-guaranteed lifetime annuities.

Suuuuure.