Defaulting on The Social Security Trust Fund Bonds: Winner and LosersDean Baker
Thenon-partisan Congressional Budget Officeupdated its long-term projections on the solvency of Social Security last month, finding that the program's major trust funds could be tapped out in 2033. TheCBO's analysisfound that if the projected gap between the outlays from the trust funds and...
So far, there have been 11 years in which the Social Security program did not take in enough FICA taxes to pay the current year's benefits.During that time, Trust Fund bonds in the amount of about $24 billion made up the difference. Social Security’s costs will grow in coming years a...
Comprehensive and meticulously documented facts about Social Security. Learn about Social Security's taxes, benefits, financial status, reform options, and more. For example: • Taxable Maximum • Causes of Fiscal Problems • Old-Age Benefits • “Looting the Trust Fund” • Personal Ownersh...
At hand is the issue of whether the Social Security Trust Fund, which currently consists only of government bonds, should be permitted to invest some of those funds in the stock market under controlled guidelines to give participants the higher yields that have been historically typical of stocks...
Undocumented workers also pay an estimated $26 billion in Social Security taxes each year. The loss of that money could accelerate the insolvency of the program’s trust fund. Economic Gains May Boost Retirement Savings If Trump’s first term is any indication, the president...
The aim of this book is to document, on a solid and convincing foundation, two public policy mistakes of the United States Government that have been extremely costly. First, the failure to combine stocks with long-term government bonds in the Social Security Trust Fund, the way other nations...
Between the mid-1980s and 2009, Social Security was intentionally taking in more money than it was paying out, but as of 2010 it began to take in less. However, due to the treasury bonds purchased during the surplus years, the size of the trust fund will actually continue to increase un...
The model assumes that social security is financed on a ‘pay-as-you-go’ basis; any accumulation or decumulation of the Social Security trust fund is ignored, as is any link between marginal additional taxes paid and additional future benefits.39To calculate the budget constraint of the Social...
:“The CBO assumes that Social Security and Medicare Part A will draw on the general fund of the US Treasury… …to cover benefit shortfalls following the depletion of their trust funds, which at the current rate will occur in 2034. That would obviously lead to an exploding debt, but it...