Social Security started out as a Ponzi scheme, and only the first few who got in on the ground floor hit the big pay off, while the rest have been relying on the continued pay-in to be there to cover THEIR future benefits, as their contribution has already been spent (or pillaged by the shenanigans done just about every year on the budget).
Social Security would have been MUCH more successful if it had been privatized years ago, and it would have been on a sound fiscal by now.
With Life Expectancy increasing from 61 in 1935 to 78 today, the entire SS System as implemented was doomed to failure.
Of course, a higher Infant Mortality Rate back then skewed the Life Expectancy Age, but that is never mentioned.
SS was designed as “insurance”, not a Government Pension to help the Elderly (at the time) Population with a supplemental source of Income.
Even when Reagan overhauled it increasing the so called “full Benefit” Age from 65 to 67, the early Benefit age was unchanged at 62. That third Rail thing you know.