"couldn't help but spend it and replace it with worthless IOUs."
Those worthless IOU's are US Treasury securities. The same ones people buy.
Also, many companies provide Disability Insurance as part of the benefits package. This covers people who do not have it and become disabled. I would not really consider it unnecessary or political pandering. Would this writer consider disability for our Soldiers to also be unnecessary?
Not sure where you got this from, but the presentation seems slanted to me.