WILLisms.com: Social Security Reform Thursday: Part 76 -- Social Security Crisis Nearer Than Common Wisdom Holds.

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Social Security Reform Thursday: Part 76 -- Social Security Crisis Nearer Than Common Wisdom Holds.

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

That's why WILLisms.com offers a chart or graph, every Thursday or so, pertinent to Social Security reform.

This week's topic:

The Downward Roller Coaster Begins Today.

In just a few short years, Social Security will begin paying out more than it takes in (.pdf):

In theory, Social Security is supposed to continue paying benefits after 2017 by drawing on the Social Security Trust Fund.
Furthermore, the trust fund is supposed to provide sufficient funds to continue paying full benefits until 2041, after which it will be exhausted. At that point, by law, Social Security benefits will have to be cut by approximately 27 percent.

However, in reality, the Social Security Trust Fund is not an asset that can be used to pay benefits. Any Social Security surpluses accumulated to date have been spent, leaving a trust fund that consists only of government bonds (IOUs) that will eventually have to be repaid by taxpayers.

There's a Social Security shortfall, and it's not 20 or 30 or 30 years away. It's knocking on our door.

The clock is still ticking:

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

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Previous Reform Thursday graphics can be seen here:

-Week One (Costs Exceed Revenues).
-Week Two (Social Security Can't Pay Promised Benefits).
-Week Three (Americans Getting Older).
-Week Three, bonus (The Templeton Curve).
-Week Four (Fewer Workers, More Retirees).
-Week Five (History of Payroll Tax Base Increases).
-Week Six (Seniors Living Longer).
-Week Six, bonus (Less Workers, More Beneficiaries).
-Week Seven (History of Payroll Tax Increases).
-Week Seven, bonus (Personal Accounts Do Achieve Solvency).
-Week Eight (Forty Year Trend Of Increasing Mandatory Spending).
-Week Nine (Diminishing Benefits Sans Reform).
-Week Ten (Elderly Dependence On Social Security).
-Week Eleven (Entitlement Spending Eating The Budget).
-Week Twelve (Benefit Comparison, Bush's Plan versus No Plan).
-Week Thirteen (Younger Americans and Lifecycle Funds).
-Week Fourteen (The Thrift Savings Plan).
-Week Fifteen (Understanding Progressive Indexing).
-Week Sixteen (The Graying of America).
-Week Seventeen (Debunking Myths).
-Week Eighteen (Debunking Myths).
-Week Nineteen (Reform Needed Sooner Rather Than Later).
-Week Twenty (Global Success With Personal Accounts).
-Week Twenty-One (GROW Accounts: Stopping The Raid).
-Week Twenty-Two (Millions of Lockboxes).
-Week Twenty-Three (Support for Ryan-DeMint).
-Week Twenty-Four (KidSave Accounts).
-Week Twenty-Five (Latinos and Social Security).
-Week Twenty-Six (AmeriSave).
-Week Twenty-Seven (Cost Of Doing Nothing).
-Week Twenty-Eight (Chile).
-Week Twenty-Nine (Entitlement Spending Out Of Control).
-Week Thirty (Reform Better Deal Than Status Quo).
-Week Thirty-One (Social Security As A Labor Cost).
-Week Thirty-Two (Social Security And Dependence On Government).
-Week Thirty-Three (Social Security, Currently A Bad Deal For African-Americans).
-Week Thirty-Four (Longer Life Expectancies Straining Social Security).
-Week Thirty-Five (Howard Dean & Salami).
-Week Thirty-Six (Growing Numbers of Beneficiaries Draining Social Security).
-Week Thirty-Seven (The Crisis Is Now).
-Week Thirty-Eight (Disability Benefits).
-Week Thirty-Nine (Broken Benefit Calculation Formula).
-Week Forty (German Social Security Disaster).
-Week Forty-One (Crumbling Pyramid Scheme).
-Week Forty-Two (Overpromising, Globally).
-Week Forty-Three (Demographic Wave).
-Week Forty-Four (The Jerk Store).
-Week Forty-Five (Defined Benefit Plans).
-Week Forty-Six (Even The Empty Promises Are A Bad Deal).
-Week Forty-Seven (Our Aging Population).
-Week Forty-Eight (The Tax Increases Required To Cover Social Security's Costs).
-Week Forty-Nine (Much Longer To Get Your Money Back From Social Security).
-Week Fifty (A Vote, At Last).
-Week Fifty-One (We Can Do Better).
-Week Fifty-Two (Socialist Security).
-Week Fifty-Three (China Has The Same Problem, Only Worse).
-Week Fifty-Four (Potential Crisis Size).
-Week Fifty-Five (The Crisis Moves Closer).
-Week Fifty-Six (Big Brother Social Security).
-Week Fifty-Seven (Personal Accounts Are Awesome).
-Week Fifty-Eight (Private Accounts and Presidential Proposals).
-Week Fifty-Nine (The False Promises Of Social Security = Unwise Investing/Saving).
-Week Sixty (Declining Rate Of Return).
-Week Sixty-One (Entitlement Spending Threatens America's Defense Capabilities).
-Week Sixty-Two (Dismal Rates Of Return Only Getting Worse).
-Week Sixty-Three (Lost Time, Growing Shortfall).
-Week Sixty-Four (Solutions & Consequences).
-Week Sixty-Five (Totalization Agreements).
-Week Sixty-Six (The 7.65% Solution).
-Week Sixty-Seven (No Reform Means The End Of Many Federal Agencies Or, More Likely, Higher Taxes).
-Week Sixty-Eight (Our Next President Faces Serious Social Security Challenges).
-Week Sixty-Nine (Taxing Social Security Benefits).
-Week Seventy (Democrats Just Want Higher Taxes).
-Week Seventy-One (Max Baucus = Thief).
-Week Seventy-Two (Social Security's Proportion Of The Federal Budget).
-Week Seventy-Three (America Becomes Junk Bonder Without Social Security Fix).
-Week Seventy-Four (Obama's Plan To Raise Social Security Taxes).
-Week Seventy-Five (The Baby Boomers Have Begun Trickling Into Retirement).

Posted by Will Franklin · 5 February 2009 11:38 AM

Comments

With the way Obama and the rest of the Socialist's are spending and planning ways of making this country into a Socialist Society, we all are going to be on one form or another of "Soc Sec" sooner than we know. IF we don't get a rein in on the Bail Outs and the rest of Obama and the Dems spending soon, we are headed down hill all the way on the slipperiest slope we ever imagined. Soc Sec is a ponzi scheme that our Govt forces us to pay into. WHY? Because we are all too stupid and helpless to take care of our selves. OR so they think!

Posted by: ZsaZsa at February 5, 2009 12:33 PM

I recently convinced my son, who is now 24 going on maturity to start putting away as much money as his portions of his SS payments. i used some of your posting to make him realize that the federal government possesses no more wealth that it seizes from people.

I also showed him my Excel spreadsheet that I generated. I took one half of my portion of SS for every year I had worked and showed him that compounding this increasing amount of money on a YEARLY basis would yield more than what SS could ever think about paying. I used a conservative five percent interest rate for my first forty years and a three percent rate for the last six years.
Investing one-half of my SS in a private account would yield vastly more than my expected return from SS. Plus, the money I invested would not simply disappear after the Feds paid me $255.00 for dying.

Posted by: Eneils Bailey at February 5, 2009 01:39 PM

EB, That is so great that you convinced your son to do that! I just HOPE we will have a CHANGE of POTUS in 2012! Obama is starting to make Jimmy Carter look good. AND Obama has only been in office less than 3 weeks!. Yikes!

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