They paid in for those payments they receive. The failing is the government didn’t actually invest the money but spent it.
Their “investment” was to “buy” government bonds so they can just spend the money of whatever they want.. and give pathetically low returns.
Please don’t give me the democrats bs, the irresponsibility of the establishment Is not limited to one party… not even close.
Democracy is always short sighted. No way elected politicians are going to have that surplus of baby boomer SS contributions and not spend it. At least now no more faking it, there is no surplus. They’ll have to transfer the SS IOUs to real Treasury debt. It’s all on the Fed Reserve to paper over the debt now. I didn’t think this charade could last this long, but here we are.