Social Security debate (United States) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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• Projections were made by the Board of Trustees of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Federal Disability Insurance Trust Funds (OASDI) in their 68th report dated March 25, 2008. The board at the time was commissioner Michael J. Astrue, who was nominated for the position by President Bush in 2006, ...
  
  According to these projections based on the system's current revenue and benefit structure, expenses will exceed tax receipts beginning in 2017. The Trust Fund is projected to continue to grow for several years thereafter because the analyses assume interest income from loans made to the US Treasury is available to cover the difference. However, the funds from loans made have been spent along with other revenues in the general funds in satisfying annual budgets. At some point, however, absent any change in the law, the Social Security Administration will finance payment of benefits through the net redemption of the assets in the Trust Fund. Because those assets consist solely of U.S. government securities, their redemption will represent a call on the federal government's general fund, which for decades has been borrowing the Trust Fund's surplus and applying it to its expenses to partially satisfy budget deficits. To finance such a projected call on the general fund, some combination of increasing taxes, cutting other government programs, selling government assets, or borrowing would be required.
  
• The Center for Economic and Policy Research says that "Social Security is more financially sound today than it has been throughout most of its 69-year history" and that Bush's statement should have no credibility.[10] Liberal economist Paul Krugman, deriding what he called "the hype about a Social Security crisis", writes:

[T]here is a long-run financing problem.
But it's a problem of modest size. The [CBO] report finds that extending the life of the trust fund into the 22nd century, with no change in benefits, would require additional revenues equal to only 0.54 percent of G.D.P. That's less than 3 percent of federal spending — less than we're currently spending in Iraq. And it's only about one-quarter of the revenue lost each year because of President Bush's tax cuts — roughly equal to the fraction of those cuts that goes to people with incomes over $500,000 a year. Given these numbers, it's not at all hard to come up with fiscal packages that would secure the retirement program, with no major changes, for generations to come.[The New York Times > Opinion > Inventing a Crisis]

• Proponents [of privatization] argue that a privatized system would open up new funds for investment in the economy, and would produce real growth. They claim that the treasuries held in the current Trust Fund are covering consumption rather than investments, and that their value rests solely upon the continued ability of the U.S. government to impose taxes.
  
  Opponents respond that there would be no net new funds for investment, because any money diverted into private accounts would produce a dollar-for-dollar increase in the federal government's borrowing from other sources to cover its general deficit.
  
• Invest a portion of the trust funds in indexed funds
  (15-45% reduction in shortfall )
  
  PRO:In the most optimistic scenario, the trust would earn higher returns on its investment.
  
  CON:Since the US government has a debt, this amounts to borrowing money in bonds to invest in the stock market, or margin trading.Cost of transition between $600 billion - $3 trillion.Less likeley scenarios involve lower or negative returns.

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