The same Phil Gramm who this week said the economy is not as bad as people think and that we’ve “become a nation of whiners” once tried to peddle so-called “death bonds” to the state of Texas and its teacher pension fund.
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“Ghoulish,” some pension administrators called the idea, according to The Dallas Morning News.
Gramm, vice chairman of Swiss banking giant UBS and a former Texas senator, is a key adviser to presidential candidate John McCain. His remarks about the economy were a big topic of campaign coverage Thursday.
In December 2003, soon after he joined UBS, Gramm met quietly with Texas officials, The News reported. He wanted the state to sell bonds and use the proceeds to buy annuities and life insurance policies on thousands of retired teachers, with their knowledge. The plan supposedly would have reaped millions of dollars for the Teacher Retirement System of Texas.
The state rejected the idea.
This week, Gramm told the Washington Times that the current economic malaise is “a mental recession,” not a real recession, yet.
“Misery sells newspapers,” Gramm said. “Thank God the economy is not as bad as you read in the newspaper every day.”
He should be sure to tell that to his employer. UBS has written off nearly $40 billion in bad real-estate-related loans and is being investigated by federal authorities.
Gramm has been registered as a lobbyist for UBS, but he said that is no longer the case.
([Muckety](https://createpositivechange.org/2008/07/11/phil-gramms-death-bonds-idea-didnt-fly-in-texas/4062)