Money sitting in a government "lockbox" is just like money stuffed in a mattress--your money is not earning any interest or growing in any real sense, nor is it being used to help the economy, in fact, it is losing ground to inflation. Yes, the government is paying interest on treasury bonds, but this doesn't come from anywhere but the government itself. This is like you putting your retirement savings in a sock and putting a little extra in the sock for 'interest'. The money hasn't really earned any income from outside sources. We would be better buying CD's from a bank, at least we would be earning some interest.
Flip side: the money under the matress or in the sock is hard real spendable cash, not bits in a computer or (more relevant to SS) an accounting trick.
Actually, it's more like writing an IOU to yourself for retirement, then blowing the cash. Trust fund my a$$. If I took out a collateral loan, then spent the collateral I'd get screwed. If the government does it, it's SOP and no one wants to rock the boat.
The thing that caught my attention in this article was the 5 year time frame.
Exactly.