Social Security Ending In 2023? No. But What Really Happens When The
Trust Fund Is Emptied?
Elizabeth Bauer
Senior Contributor
Retirement
I write about retirement policy from an actuary's perspective.
Earlier this week, the Social Security Administration’s
chief actuary reported,
in response to a question by Senate Democrats Chuck Schumer, Bernie
Sanders, and Ron Wyden, that, if the dedicated payroll taxes to fund
Social Security
were removed with no replacement income source, the Disability
Insurance Trust Fund would be depleted in the middle of 2021 and the
Retirement/Survivors’
Trust Fund, in mid-2023.
This is no surprise — though the dates are sooner than my prior
back-of-the-envelope calculation
in a prior article.
It’s fairly obvious that the key is the provision in the hypothetical,
as specified by the Democrats, that there would be “no alternative
source of revenue
to replace the elimination of payroll taxes.” I have said regularly
(and again in that that article) that I believe there would be a
“Social Security fix”
— legislation to simply direct general revenues to fill in the cap,
whether it’s the 20% gap that has long been expected, or the full
obligation in the
event that the payroll tax were ended. I’ve further said that I could
well see Congress legislating this as a “temporary fix,” over and over
again, until
the political stars align for a permanent change.
In other words, a headline such as NBC’s “
Terminating payroll tax could end Social Security benefits in 2023,
chief actuary warns
” is highly misleading because it lacks that caveat: if there’s no
other revenue source.
On 9/3/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
and those stories aren't true. But Trump's plan to cut the social security
tax for a period of time would be bad for its funding. If they leave it
alone, it will be fine for decades. If they raise the cut off point at which
taxes are taken from whatever it is now which is a bit more than $100,000
annually, then the wealthy will be doing their share to fund it and it won't
ever run out of money.
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Andy Baracco
Sent: Thursday, September 3, 2020 3:26 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: a post about ssi and ssd which does not look
good at all
I follow legislation fairly closely and have heard or read nothing about
this. i have heard that there are projections pointing to the fact that the
Social Security program could run out of money in 2023, but stories like
this come out periodically.
Andy
----- Original Message -----
From: Miriam Vieni <mailto:miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, September 03, 2020 6:20 AM
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: a post about ssi and ssd which does not look
good at all
Helen,
Where did you see that information? I don't think he can just do that with
an executive order.
Miriam
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > On Behalf Of Helen Murphy
(Redacted sender "murphyhm123" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, September 2, 2020 11:21 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] a post about ssi and ssd which does not look good
at all
SSI and SSD public assistance, trump is trying to stop for good,
folks must fight back, not let it happen at all. all must write to his,
her elected officials of this disturbing idea, a lookup will trump stop
SSI and SSD, he must be stopped right in his tracks,
posted tonight @ 11;19 pm, September 2, 2020. please post thank you very
much Helen Murphy
