Social Security Reform and the Full-Funding Concept

Abstract

Social Security, more accurately the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) program, is woefully underfunded as measured by the long-term actuarial balance. Its reserves, on deposit with the U.S. Treasury Department, will be depleted in 2033, notwithstanding the fact that there is no money there. The surpluses that created them following the 1983 Amendments ended in 2010. The so-called reserves have long since been spent on other government programs and obligations. Yet the fiction endures. This article examines the origins of the full-funding standard and then analyses the real funding problems of OASDI and how they are measured. If the OASDI is seen as the pay-as-you-go system that it is, its problems would be more easily managed.