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Reform Thursday: Week Nine.

Thursdays are good days for reform, because they fall between Wednesdays and Fridays.

That's why WILLisms.com will display a chart or graph, every Thursday, pertinent to Social Security reform. The graphics are mostly self-explanatory, but we include commentary on some of them where and when necessary.

Today's graphic comes to us from the left-wing Economic Policy Institute:

Click image for original.

The very left-leaning Economic Policy Institute opposes Social Security reform, yet they display the graphic (which needs some minor updating following the new Trustees Report) on their website), one might suppose, to make the case that there is no impending crisis.

However, as 15-year-old Alex Binz points out, the time between now and 2041 is not as wonderful and carefree as groups like the Economic Policy Institute want us to believe. Beginning in just about a dozen years (very much the short-term), in 2017, Social Security will begin to have more benefit obligations than revenues. It will owe more than it takes in.

What will sustain the system another two dozen years beyond 2017 is the "trust fund." This "trust fund" is a troubling misnomer: the money in the so-called "trust fund" is actually being spent each year by the federal bureaucracy, not put into any kind of Algorian "lock-box."

Furthermore, once the storm does hit and the government IOUs run out, in 2041, the promised benefits for the WILLisms.com generation drop drastically, without any rebound in sight.

Why, then, does a liberal anti-reform organization display today's Reform Thursday image, which, although partially misleading, is actually consequential evidence for reform?

Blind ideology/partisanship, perhaps?

Or maybe the Economic Policy Institute truly wants to "gut" promised benefits for those now in their 20s. Someone born in 1981 will see a major slash in benefits, guaranteed, if Congress does not act soon to reform the system.

Previous Reform Thursday graphics can be seen here:

-Week One.

-Week Two.

-Week Three.

-Week Three, bonus.

-Week Four.

-Week Five.

-Week Six.

-Week Six, bonus.

-Week Seven.

-Week Seven, bonus.

-Week Eight.

Tune into WILLisms.com each Thursday for more important graphical data supporting Social Security reform.

Posted by Will Franklin · 31 March 2005 09:34 AM

Comments

Posted by: Zsa Zsa at March 31, 2005 07:55 PM