[The Pack Knight]

The big problem, however, is that the Federal government has been getting huge amounts of money and absolutely pillaging the fund and squandering the money. That’s where the problem lies.

From the Article: "#19 In 1950, each retiree's Social Security benefit was paid for by 16 U.S. workers. According to new data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are now only 1.75 full-time private sector workers for each person that is receiving Social Security benefits in the United States."

I think that's the real problem, and that doesn't have anything to do with Congress raiding the "trust fund".

The problem is that Social Security was a short-sighted and ill-conceived plan from the very beginning. It was based on the assumption that the demographic makeup that existed in the 1930s would continue in perpetuity. That assumption was proven wrong decades ago, but nothing was ever done about it.

[Houghton M.]

You skirted the real problem even as you pointed to the shift from 16/1 to 1.75/1.

Contraception. Ideal family size of 2 children, a boy and a girl.

[livius]

It was based on the assumption of youth, but the money was supposed to be kept separate. It was never invested very well (this is a government program, after all) but very early on, it became a fund that other programs could dip into and then it was not invested at all.

Other countries - such as Chile - have actually started funds that have been able to make generous one-time payouts followed by comfortable annuity payments simply by taking this huge wad of cash and investing it. We didn’t do, and now we no longer even have any cash to invest.