Nick,
Lest anyone be confused, Social Security's net assets have *increased*
every year since 1982 and the longer-term trend certainly has been so
(see http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/STATS/table4a3.html). This doesn't mean we
can close our eyes to the future population shifts, but it does mean
that any hint that there is a present-day crisis, rather than a far
future one, surely must be regarded as politically, not financially
motivated. In the cliche of good journalism, "Follow the money."
Slight disagreement with one point here, Nick: "not financially motivated" could be misread. I believe that the current "crisis" in Social Security is very much financially motivated -- in the Fall 1983 Cato Journal article "Achieving Social Security Reform: A 'Leninist' Strategy," Authors Stuart Butler and Peter Germanis couldn't be more clear about who the primary beneficiaries of reform are:
What we must do is construct a coalition around the ... plan,
a coalition that will gain directly from its implementation.
That coalition should consist of not only those who will reap
benefits from the ... private system ... but also the banks,
insurance companies, and other institutions that will gain
from providing such plans to the public.It's a gripping read: http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj3n2/cj3n2-11.pdf,
and appears as part of an entire issue (http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj3n2/cj3n2.html)
devoted to "Social Security: Continuing Crisis or Real Reform?"
Enjoy,
Dave
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