Classically Liberal: Lying about Ayn Rand and Social Security
in 1966 Rand's Objectivist Newsletter said that not collecting from programs that one is forced to finance would be wrong. It said:
...the victims, who opposed such laws, have a clear right to any refund of their own money—and they would not advance the cause of freedom if they left their money unclaimed, for the benefit of the welfare-state administration.
The AlterNet smear also claimed that Rand said that the link between smoking and cancer was a hoax. She actually never said that. She said she was not convinced that the case had been made, and at the time it hadn't been fully made. She never said it was a hoax and she stopped smoking instantly when her physician showed her a dark spot on her own lung's x-ray.
According to AlterNet one Evva Joan Pryor, "who had been a social worker in New Yorker" said that "I remember telling her that this was going to be difficult. For me to do my job she had to recognize that there were exceptions to her theory." What job was that? Well, if you believe AlterNet she was "social worker" during this period. The implication being that Rand had to seek out a social worker to help her. Some smear-mongers of Rand have argued with me that she died penniless as the result of the evils of capitalism and that was why she sought out this social worker.
Pryor was NOT a social worker. She worked for the law firm of Ernst, Crane Gitlin & Winick which handled all legal matters for Rand. Nor was Rand penniless or in need. She was penniless when she arrived in America but during this period she had cash reserves of a few hundred thousand dollars and a steady income from book royalties.
Rand had sufficient resources to cover the health issues she faced. In fact, she had sufficient funds to pay for heart surgery for her brother-in-law from Russia. Rand's estate had a substantial sum of cash at the time of Rand's death indicating that Pryor's concerns that health costs could "bankrupt" Rand never took place. And, since Pryor argued that Rand should have these things in case health care bankrupted her, it is entirely possible that Rand never got a cent. We just don't know. But if she did, there is nothing to attack her over either.