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Posted on 06/04/2026 9:08:41 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
Social Security’s finances may be in worse shape than thought.
The Social Security Trustees — who release a report each year on the health of the program that supports about 70 million retirees and people with disabilities — have been relying on overly optimistic forecasts for future fertility rates, according to a blog report from the Cato Institute.
Those forecasts are at odds with projections from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) — the nonpartisan federal agency that provides Congress with independent analysis of budgetary and economic issues — which both have much more sober forecasts for fertility rates.
Fertility rates and longevity are important to the finances of Social Security. Under a “pay-as-you-go” system like Social Security, taxes from current workers pay the benefits of current retirees. As fewer young people enter the labor force, there are fewer active taxpayers to support each beneficiary at a time when people are living longer — and taking benefits for longer.
“The Trustees are likely understating Social Security’s insolvency problem by assuming Americans will start having far more children than current trends suggest,” according to the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.
“Optimistic population assumptions translate into optimistic financial projections. In a pay-as-you-go system like Social Security, higher assumed fertility means more future workers paying taxes to finance benefits and thus a smaller projected shortfall,” the Cato blog report said.
(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
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Yet another reason I took the very first dollar Congress was offering.
When the music stops, all hell will break loose.
I could still read the article entirely though, even with the ad blocking half the screen.
“Another dire problem for Social Security: Trustees may be calculating the birth rate wrong”. As long as I get paid until I die, paid into it for a long time.
Anchor babies (birthright slobs) have really screwed everything up too.
Wait you mean there isn’t a lockbox? So current employees fund retired?
AI will severely impact future SS rev projections. however i am 100 pct confident in the govt’s ability to print money and keep it going … until it finally derails. i wont see that.
The Census chart line shows a gradual decline from ~1.64 to 1.56, but we'll blow through that in a matter of months at current rates. The CBO prediction is weird, going slightly lower to around 1.52 and then climbing at a tiny rate for the rest of the century back to 1.54.
Meanwhile across Europe and Asia rates are headed lower. Even if the Amish keep having babies I don't see a generation of LGBTQ-confused and feminazi-influenced youth having kids at higher rates than the recent past. So I expect the problem to be far more serious than even the "conservative" estimates here. What happens with the Social Security system if the TFR winds up looking like Japan or South Korea?
All those immigrants breed a lot. Get them on the payroll. “I need muh check, man!”
Remove the salary cap on SS taxes and call SS “welfare” or “foreign aid”. It’s never a problem funding those.
Cut benefits on current or soon to be SS recipients and watch the tax cheating on IRA and 401(k) distributions like no one has ever seen before. Bastards.
AI is the wild card.
Even if we can transition to UBI and it is financially sustainable, there will be unintended consequences.
The music won’t ‘stop’, but the volume will be turned down. Current projections indicate ~78% funding after 2033.
Reality is, the richest cohort in the country is the same cohort that receives SS welfare. If SS welfare was means tested so that only people below the median income received it, they could make full payments to that neediest segment.
But a ‘pay as you go’ welfare scheme for everyone can’t work. Math.
The folks making all the babies don’t work, don’t pay taxes, and their kids will follow the same path.
You’ll see an explosion of the new Grifters over the coming decade.
Un-American, in Spirit and Action, but behind a wall of racist/religious/ethnic protection.
They are using overly optimistic figures because if they used the real ones it would force them to do something about it which they prefer not to deal with. Seems they are just gonna keep spending until everything collapses.
But you didn’t pay enough to afford what you’re being given now. That’s the problem So you’re just stealing from subsequent generations.
Those born after 1975 face a negative return dollar for dollar on their SS ‘contributions’.
The moral thing to do would be to end the Ponzi, but the greed of the electorate will keep it going irrespective of the harm caused.
”I gotta get mine before I die!”
But it’s not really ‘theirs’, it’s somebody’s wealth they’re laying claim to…
There are a lot of us older GenX that are going to get absolutely screwed on this
I will have paid the max contribution for nearly 40 years by the time I am eligible—which is after it is projected to start going into default so frankly I don’t care if they turn it off completely today
The fair thing to do would be for the govt to figure out how much there is, how much they can raise and then figure out what percentage they can pay back to those who paid in at an average nominal interest rate—if it 10% or 50% or 100% after subtracting anything paid to recipients.
100% correct
People receiving it say they paid in so much but the average person who started paying into it in the 70’s has likely received more than they paid in within a few years even considering interest.
Medicare if the biggest problem though—pay in maybe tens of thousands of dollars and get hundreds of thousands back in your last few years?
I would suggest putting Doge on Social Security. Let’s see what that comes up with. Probably 10x worse then the worst predictions we’re seeing now.
Good news though, "Boomers" will get every penny out of the system before it collapses
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