Illinois Resident Patty Nye Blasts Senator Dick Durbin for Calling Seniors “Greediest Generation”-Fiction!
Summary of eRumor:
Illinois resident blasted U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois, for calling seniors the “greediest generation” for their use of Social Security.
The Truth:
Rumors about Patty Nye’s letter to Dick Durbin is a new variation on an old (and partially true) rumor. The story goes Durbin compared Social Security to “a milk cow with 310 million teats” and called senior citizens the greediest generation ever for their reliance on it. Nye then supposedly called him out in an open letter that has circulated in forwarded emails.
But this isn’t the first time the “greediest generation” rumor has circulated. Former U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson, a Republican from Wyoming, actually made the milk cow-Social Security comparison in a 2010 email to a group of “older women” critical of his proposals to reform the program. He didn’t, however, say that senior citizens were the greediest generation ever (at least in the email). Here’s the excerpt:
Anyway, have a look at it and if you should choose, you might communicate with me. If you have some better suggestions about how to stabilize Social Security instead of just babbling into the vapors, let me know. And yes, I’ve made some plenty smart cracks about people on Social Security who milk it to the last degree. You know ‘em too. It’s the same with any system in America. We’ve reached a point now where it’s like a milk cow with 310 million tits! Call when you get honest work!
Simpson caught plenty of flack for the comments at the time. And an open letter by a woman identified as Patty Myers from Montana began to circulate in 2011. Earlier versions of the letter were unsigned, and Myers’ identity has never been verified.
Later, variations of the greediest generation quote and follow-up later emerged. One of them attributed the “greediest generation” quote to Dick Durbin and the follow-up letter to an Illinois woman named Patty Nye. Given the earlier history, these claims are obviously false. Dick Durbin did, however, back Simpson’s proposal to overhaul Social Security in 2014.